Student Leadership Through Coding
What do you get when you mix computational practices, concepts, and dispositions together with unplugged coding approaches?!?!
Throughout the months of January and February, students and staff at St. Joseph Catholic School in Gananoque found out the answers to this question — the answers being FUN, and more fun with learning how to digitally control a physical object using what is called Computational Thinking (CT; see Figure 3, below).
Computational Thinking: The skills, concepts, and dispositions that students develop and use to control objects, build digital applications, simulate events, and create and visualize data models.
The physical object being controlled is known as a Sphero Indi — a small robotic vehicle that responds to color cards. Each color card specifies an action the Indi, the friendly little vehicle, uses to control direction, speed, sound, and lighting patterns. This piece of technology is one of several coding robots purchased and being made available by CDSBEO’s Curriculum Department.
Not only do students learn about sequencing these cards to make Indi respond in particular ways, but they also develop and use many CT skills and concepts through varied teaching and learning approaches. What is often looked upon as the most important aspect of computer programming (coding) are the dispositions that students develop (Figure 3).
At St. Joseph’s Catholic School, a unique approach to both teaching and learning was taken to help build a coder’s mindset — buddy coding. This student leadership approach allowed students to experience a type of learning that occurs between children of different age groups. Specifically, students in Intermediate grades developed and used their coding skills, concepts, and dispositions by first learning how to work with Indi, and then transferred their learning to coaching students in Primary grades — as they, too, went about learning how they could represent and demonstrate their thinking with Indi (Figure 3).
“There are plenty of resources for learning to code, but none is better than a real person who can explain concepts to you, brainstorm logic with you, and answer questions for you. This is why, whether you’re an experienced programmer or a complete beginner, you should get a coding buddy.”
For context, here’s a sample of what school leadership, teachers, and students (both leaders and first-time coders) had to say about learning to code with the Sphero Indi.
Figure 3: Computational Thinking Framework (2018)
Student Coding Leaders’ Perspectives
Student Coding Leader, Brynleigh (Grade 7), had the following to say about her experience working with students in Kindergarten and Grade 1:
In the beginning, I was a lot more involved in placing tiles and the car. Now, I ask questions to the students and have them make more decisions. If they ask a question, I let them explore and guide them to find the answer themselves.
[A strength of mine is patience] with accepting others’ ideas. I also use patience because there are a lot of ways the tiles can move and decisions that can be made…
It makes me excited to know that other people understand the Indi because I have taken the time to guide them.
Leadership skills that I have used and grown during these experiences are:
Flexibility — with [students’] ideas and learning styles
Positivity — when something doesn’t work (to not get down about it and help them fix their mistakes)
Creativity — being able to reengage kids if they lose interestCommunication — asking questions instead of always giving an answer, allowing [students] to make decisions.”
Brynleigh’s teacher, Jennifer Nalon, observed that she was an amazing teacher through all her coding leadership opportunities, and when asked about her experiences, Brynleigh said, “When I had two younger students working together, they had to learn to take turns making decisions and sharing, and I had to learn how to draw their thinking out of them.”
Several of Brynleigh’s peers — Student Coding Leaders — also had much to say about their experiences working with students in Kindergarten and Grade 1.
·“Some students needed a lot of guidance and others didn’t, and I had to figure out what each student I worked with needed” (Brendan). Brendan also wondered if his teaching of the Indi will motivate younger students to take on a leadership role with younger students to them.
Alyssa noticed that students enjoyed trial-and-error when they had her with them to problem solve.
George wondered if changing the way he tells students about the Indi would make the experience different.
Quinnly felt that it was great to share his skills and see the children’s faces light up when they figured it out.
Sarah loved that she could use coding to create new bonds with younger students.
Georgia said she knows that when she was their age, she would have been super excited to work with the 7/8s. “The leadership skill of positivity is really important. If I am positive towards a task that we are working on, the students I am working with will also arrive with a positive attitude.”
“A leadership skill I needed to use was patience. We must be patient to not rush their thinking and to make their own decisions (not what we were thinking)” (Steven).
Author: Chris Stewart, CDSBEO Technology-Enabled Learning & Teaching Contact
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