This program is free and is functional for students across all years of primary school as it has varying levels of complexity. This program can be used for teaching Maths and English whilst allowing students to develop their basic computer skills. Students are able to access this program from anywhere where there is a computer and can work on any level or topic when work has not been assigned. ABCya provides a fun interactive experience to assist in learning fundamental skills in the areas of literacy and numeracy.
Year Levels: K-6
Subject: Technologies
Strands: Digital Technologies
General Capabilities:
Literacy: Students complete interactive games focused around their development of phonics and word structure.
Numeracy: Students use this program to develop their basic facts in an interactive way.
Information and Communication Technologies: Students complete their work on a computer or iPad, this allows them to develop their basic understanding of computer skills.
Integrated Learning Opportunities:
Mathematics and English
Content Descriptors:
Use data to solve similar tasks/problems (ACTDIP003)
Link to site:
http://www.abcya.com/
Further Information:
The program is free to use for educators and students.
ABCya uses interactive games to teach through play.
The site has a family option to allow students to learn at home with their families.
Gonoodle is a fun interactive website and app that students and teachers can use in many different ways.
Subject: Digital Technologies
Year Level: Kindy to year 6- This app is probably most rewarding for lower primary aged children, but all students can have fun with is and the meditation activities can be beneficial to all ages.
Strand: Knowledge and Understanding.
Sub Strand: Digital systems (hardware and software) are used in everyday life and have specific features(ACTDIK001)
Students can use Meta-Chart to create different types of graphs online. Students can choose how they would like to represent their data – the site allows them to create bar graphs, pie charts, histograms etc. This is a great way for students to experiment with technology while still learning about data representation. Students follow three easy steps and are then able to create their graph and see it represented on their screen.
Year Level: 3-4
Subject: Technologies
Strands: Digital Technologies
General Capabilities:
Literacy – the students need to be able to effectively put titles, labels etc on the graph
Numeracy – the graphing will have to do with numbers
Information and Communication Technology(ICT) – students will be using ICT to complete their graph as it is based online
Code Spark Have created an App called Academy with the Foos.
That can be used in classrooms to support students learning of coding through interactive activities. These activities include puzzles, games, step by step projects and printouts.
In the classroom, the teacher can use this app to help support the teaching and develop the students understanding of coding in interactive activities. The activities are suitable for different levels this gives students who a struggling an opportunity to develop their understanding.
Australian Curriculum- Digital Technologies: Processes and Production skills.
Kano is a fantastic computer and coding kit for children ages 6 and upwards. Students actually get to make a computer, learn what’s inside, play with the code and hopefully spark a lifelong passion for computing and the arts! Kano is a Raspberry π based project, which also utilises Sonic Pi for the music coding component.
Below is a video introducing Kano…
As can be seen by the video, Kano has been constructed to engage students immediately, showing them how a computer is designed and engineered on a basic level. As stated by Luke, it’s like putting Lego together. Students once into the coding phase can then learn to code and create games, hack into well known platforms like Minecraft and make music.
Here is another great video showing Luke using Kano.
There are great resource packages designed and built for educator and schools, which can be aligned with the school curriculum and provide great levels of support and training for the teachers. There is also the ability for the students to share their work or projects through portals and also check out what other students have created!
Digital Technologies
Link to SCSA (School Curriculum and Standards Authority)
Looking at the year 4 syllabus Kano could be introduced to explore digital systems in terms of their components and the other peripheral devices. Students learn how to manipulate and interpret data which allow students to develop the data to represent and communicate ideas. This helps to develop computational thinking.
Some Year 4 Content descriptors that would be covered by using Kano:
Knowledge & Understanding
Digital systems and peripheral devices are used for different purposes and can store and transmit different types of data (ACTDIK007)
Digital Implementation
Use simple visual programming environments that include a sequence of steps (algorithm) involving decisions made by the user (branching) (ACTDIP011)
Work with others to create and communicate ideas and information safely, using agreed protocols (netiquette) (ACTDIP013)
You can also easily see how using the Kano package can link in with the general capabilities:
Tynker is a creative computing platform where students are able to learn how to program and build Apps, games and more. It is self paced and is easily incorporated into the Western Australian school curriculum (School Curriculum and Standards Authority, Government of Western Australia) in the subject of Technologies particularly the strand of Digital Technologies.
Students are encouraged and engaged to create games and animated projects using visual coding and provides them with the knowledge foundations in programming and computational thinking which will then help their progress into mainstream object orientated programming. It has powerful kid friendly tools and guided, independent instruction for your students.
The resources and instruction that are available to teachers are also fantastic. It has ready to use, grade specific lesson plans and links to STEM project templates for Math, Science, ICT and English to name a few.
Tynker can be used across different PC platforms (Windows or Mac) and mobile devices running IOS or Android.
Links:
Below are a link to Tynker’s website which will allow a free initial sign up for schools to look at coding across Year levels 1 to 8. This will introduce your class to visual programming. In this course, students get introduced to basic programming as they create interactive stories, design animations, and make mini-games in Tynker’s game-like interface. Each lesson is designed for a class period of 45-60 minutes.
Boogie Bot is an interactive learning App that enables children to program a robot to dance. Programming the robot introduces children to the basics of coding as they interact, and develop skills using ‘Blocky’, a visual programming language. As children learn to code with coding blocks they turn ‘Boogie Bot’ into a grooving, dancing master.
This App has 5 different categories, with varying levels of difficulty. Each category introduces a different programming concept to enrich learning.
Year Level: Year 2
In the classroom:
Boogie Bot allows each child to build a robot using a blue print design, and then program it to dance along with hip music in an illuminated ‘dance zone’. Once a dance sequence has been programmed, the children transform the dance room into a grooving zone with opportunities to share their dance and earn rewards. Dance action blocks are used to create dance moves with a variety of options for children to include special effects. Rewards are earned as the children progress through different levels. This app could be integrated into Health & Physical Education by fostering ‘Boogie Bot Brain-Breaks’ during lesson transition times. The children can have ownership and design their own ‘brain-breaks’ to create those essential moments throughout the day to activate bodies and brains!
Subject: Digital Technologies
Strands:
1. Knowledge & Understanding – Digital systems
The components of digital systems: hardware, software and networks and their use.
2. Processes & Production Skills
Defining problems and designing digital solutions (Year 2)
This App supports development of Computational Thinking and enriched learning as children learn the basics of computer Science. These include; Algorithmic thinking, sequential processing, pattern recognition and looping.
General Capabilities:
Literacy, Numeracy, Information & Communication Technology, Critical & Creative Thinking
Integrated Learning Opportunities:
English, Health & Physical Education, Mathematics.
Content Descriptors:
Follow, describe and represent a sequence of steps and decisions (algorithms) needed to solve simple problems (ACTDIP004 )
Recognise and explore patterns in data and represent data as pictures, symbols and diagrams(ACTDIK002)
Recognise and explore digital systems (hardware and software components) for a purpose(ACTDIK001)
Wonder Workshop is WONDERFUL – see what I did there?
Inspiring the up and coming generation in using digital technologies can be a challenge at times, especially with maintaining attention. But Wonder Works provides colourful and engaging resources which develop students confidence and competency in using and manuvering their skills with digital technology.
Subject
Digital Technologies
Year Level
Foundation to Year Two
Strand
Knowledge and Understanding
Sub Strand
Recognise and explore digital systems (hardware and software components) for a purpose
Resource Link
https://www.makewonder.com/play/ideas/
Price
Free resource information – price varies on suggest apps for lesson plan templates
Cross Curricular Capabilities
The resources suggest that these apps can assist in most learning areas as it is used to consolidate content specific learning which fosters play based learning.
For Example – Using Go App
English: – Literacy (Foundation – Year 2)
Comprehending texts through listening, reading and viewing
Interpret and analyse learning area texts
Navigate, read and view learning area texts
Composing texts through speaking, writing and creating
Compose spoken, written, visual and multimodal learning area texts
Word Knowledge
Understand learning area vocabulary
For example – Using Blockly
Math: Chance ( Year one and two)
Year One – Identify outcomes of familiar events involving chance and describe them using everyday language such as ‘will happen’, ‘won’t happen’ or ‘might happen’
justifying that some events are certain or impossible
Year Two – identify practical activities and everyday events that involve chance. Describe outcomes as ‘likely’ or ‘unlikely’ and identify some events as ‘certain’ or ‘impossible’
classifying a list of everyday events according to how likely they are to happen, using the language of chance, and explaining reasoning
Introduce your class to coding with this App that will inject a love for coding and becoming a ‘Story Creator.’ Codeable Crafts is an introduction for children to the world of coding that will leave a lasting impression. It is fun, engaging, and enhances creativity as children develop their own imaginative stories. They use a combination of simple drawing tools to develop their own characters, and coding applications to ‘bring their characters life’.
In the classroom:
Codeable Crafts is an educational tool that allows children to learn the basic concept of Computational Thinking. It has a variety of character templates that are visually stimulating for each child to animate using a basic set of coding blocks.
There are no limits to the possibilities of stories the class can create as they become the master creators of the characters they draw, design, and animate. Codeable Crafts is an app that could be easily integrated into other areas to enrich learning whilst exposing and teaching about coding. An example is; during a unit of work introducing a writing genre, ‘narratives,’ the class would be able design their characters, write their story, and then use this app to ‘animate’ their written story. This is elementary coding that the children will love.
Google Play: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=jp.co.benesse.ccs&hl=en
Year level: Foundation – Year 1.
Subject: Digital Technologies
Strands:
Processes & Productions Skills
Computational thinking
Defining problems and defining digital solutions (F-2)
Communicating ideas and information
Knowledge & Understanding
Digital systems
The components of digital systems: hardware, software and networks and their use.
Content Descriptors:
Recognise and explore digital systems (hardware and software components) for a purpose (ACTDIK001)
Follow, describe and represent a sequence of steps and decisions (algorithms) needed to solve simple problems (ACTDIP004 )
Integrated Learning Opportunities:
English, The Arts, Mathematics
General Capabilities:
Numeracy, Critical & Creative Thinking, Information & Communication Technology, Literacy.
Getting Started:
View the brief tutorial overview showing how to decorate and animate character templates.
Simple Steps to follow:
Step One: Decorate and animate animal templates.
Step Two: Choose from My Sketchbook or My Storybook to start creating.
Step Three: Colour and add stickers to the templates in the sketchbook, and then select finished creatures to star in animated stories in the storybook.
Step Four: Start using a small set of basic coding blocks to create sound, movement, and text.
Step Five: Put the blocks together like puzzle pieces and watch the finished story.
iPad Screenshots:
Additional Information:
Free App.
Compatibility: Requires iOS 8.0 or later. Compatible with iPad.
Examine the main components of common digital systems and how they may connect together to form networks to transmit data (ACTDIK014)
Design algorithms represented diagrammatically and in structured English and validate algorithms and programs through tracing and test cases (ACTDIP04)
What is it?
The B4 is a modular computer processor kit and accompanying study guide. It has been designed to help students explore the fundamental operation of computers as part of the new Australian Curriculum: Digital Technologies. The B4 supports the teaching of the knowledge and understanding of digital systems and the representation of data.
How is it used?
The B4 consists of 11 computing modules that represent core functions of a computer processor, such as program counter, adder, inverter, memory, latch, etc. With these, students perform experiments which lead to increasingly sophisticated hardware and software arrangements.The B4 operates at human speed, allowing students to easily follow with their own eyes how data flows inside the machine.
Skills developed
Building an understanding of how computers work and are built
