#CodingFromHome

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Coding from home 3: Remote robotics, 21-day coding challenge and computer science education in Croatia on the agenda of the webinar

Around 50 participants from Belgium, Croatia, Estonia, Greece, Italy, Luxembourg, North Macedonia, Albania, Portugal, Sweden and Tunisia took part in the 3rd Coding from Home webinar on 6 April 2020.

Lidija Kralj, Assistant Minister for Strategy & General Education from Croatia presented remote computer science lessons. Maura Sandri, Leading Teacher from Italy, Paulo Torcato, Leading teacher from Portugal and Imen Taktak, Code Week Ambassador from Tunisia shared robotics and coding activities for remote learning they have developed. 

Lidija Kralj described how remote learning was organised following the Covid-19 lockdown of schools in Croatia. In the past two years all schools and teachers have been equipped with computers and tablets, which made the roll-out of the remote teaching rather smooth. After the lock-down, virtual classrooms were established for all principles, teachers and their students. The ministry has also established channels for teachers, parents and students to use.

Maura Sandri presented a 21-day coding challenge that she created to get kids, parents and educators to start coding, explore computational thinking and have fun. The coding challenges were uploaded online every morning at 10 o’clock and every evening Maura and her team checked and commented on the programmes that had been submitted. Maura has also developed an astro-documentary activity in Scratch that will soon be translated into English.

Paulo Torcato presented Scratch and basic school robotics remote lessons that he has created for children and parents. He also showed examples were he had combined robotics and science classes. He underlined that his coding classes always are combined with other subjects such as Portuguese, maths, science and English. 

Imen Taktak, Code Week ambassador Tunisia – presented three different remote activities for schools. The first was focused on “Netiquette” or Cyberethics. The second activity was about robotics where the students described a micro:bit card its components and utilities and then coded a traffic light remotely. The third activity focused on climate change where students used micro:bits to create simple weather stations. The full presentation is available online.

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Coding from home 2 – Focus on practical tips for online teaching, Coding bingo and a Coding treasure hunt

By Annika Östergren Pofantis, EU Code Week team

Be realistic. Be patient. Be kind to yourself. Adapt. Four tips from Ana Stamatescu, Romanian Code Week ambassador and education coordinator at TechSoup to teachers around the world who are starting to teach their classes online. Ana shared her experience on remote teaching together with Madhumalti Sharma, Code Week Ambassador Luxembourg and EU robotics national coordinator, Pauline Maas, Leading Teacher the Netherlands and Stefania Altieri Leading teacher from Italy at the second EU Code Week “Coding from Home” webinar Tuesday 24 March.

Ana encouraged teachers to start by picking two to three tools and testing them with your students. “Change if they are not suitable for you”, she said. Ana’s favourites are Zoom for online classes, Kahoot for interactive quizzes as well as the more traditional WhatsApp, Facebook and YouTube. She also encouraged teachers to talk seek support from their local teaching communities. “If you need help, don’t be afraid to ask for it”. Ana’s presentation is available here.

Take a cookie break!

Madhumalti shared some practical tips for people who are moving their coding workshops online:

Use conference tools such as Zoom, Microsoft Teams, GoToMeetings. Some are available for free for education and teachers.

If bandwidth allows keep all participants’ cameras on so children feel connected.

Invite participants to share their screen to show their projects.

Use mute/unmute, raise hand features.

Take a break – like in real class allow for a short break with fruits and snacks.

Record the session and share references.

She underlined that parents are welcome to join, but mostly children can manage on their own. The youngest may need help to set up the conference tools, but quickly get independent. Madhumalti’s presentation is available here.

Coding bingo and coding treasure hunt

Pauline shared her online activity Coding bingo, which includes activities ranging from baking muffins and talking about input and output, to pixel art to the Sandwich robot man where you program your parent/teacher!

Stefania shared her coding treasure hunt, which is inspired by Trivial Pursuit, where all questions are linked to coding. Read more in this blog post.

See the recording of the webinar here.

Join Coding from Home on 27 March at 11.30 CET

A third Coding from home webinar will take place on Friday 27 March 11.30 CET. Speakers include Lidija Kralj. Assistant Minister at Ministry of Science and Education, Croatia; Imen Taktak, Code Week ambassador Tunisia on a robotics; Maura Sandri, Leading Teacher Italy on a 21-day coding challenge and Paulo Torcato, Portuguese Leading teacher on Scratch and basic school robotics.