The UCDSB Digital Learning Team has been hitting the road again this school year with high tech tools aimed at sparking the imagination of students in a digital world. On Thursday, Nov. 2, team members Bryan Kearney and Shelley Murphy stopped by South Crosby Public School in Elgin with the popular Climate Action Kits for an immersive day of coding with an environmental spin!
A valuable item available through the Digital Learning Team’s Lending Library, the Climate Action Kits are micro:bit powered inventor packs that introduce students to coding and robotics. Under the guidance of the team, the Grade 5/6 students learned about wind turbines, built their own mini-versions, then through trial-and-error coding techniques were able to design a robotic widget to track the number of blade rotations.
Teacher Lacy Melrose was thrilled to have the team visit her classroom. “I think it’s great that the Digital Learning Team can come into our classrooms and actually show us how to use this coding technology we don’t always have access to. The kids were excited to know they were coming, and it gives them an opportunity to get hands-on learning for science and math combined. It’s been a great day!”
“Because coding is becoming more prevalent in the curriculum through engineering and design, it allows teachers to get the best of both worlds in a way the students love,” explained Kearney. “And it connects coding to the curriculum in many ways,” added Murphy, “not just as a standalone piece of math.”
By the end of the activity the students were excited to see who could get the most out of their new wind turbines. They headed outside to try and find the breeziest part of the yard, and using their new high tech spin counters, were able to determine which designs were best and where the wind blew the hardest.
During the 2023-2024 school year, the UCDSB Digital Learning Team will be visiting schools throughout the board with a variety of innovative learning tools.