Wednesday, February 8, 2017

Winter MAP testing

All grades have finished our winter round of MAP testing! I encourage you to reach out to your child's teacher to see where they are at academically and what goals they will be working on between now and the end of the year for each subject. All grades have moved into our coding units. They are differentiated for each grade level and move at separate paces. Look for newsletters coming home as we progress in this unit! This week in coding our classes worked on the following: 

Kindergarten/1st Graders have begun coding this week! Student's practiced how to follow a list of steps/instructions that help them finish a task. They completed a few activities that helped them learn how to properly use the arrows on the keyboard, and how they can translate those arrows into a code in order to follow instructions on their "Flurb" Assignment. I encourage you to look in their take home folder for these activities, and ask them about it! 

2nd/3rd Grade has also begun coding this week. We learned what an algorithm is and I encourage you to ask them to show you what an algorithm is by asking you to give them a set of instructions that will help them draw a smiley face! Students worked on creating codes to navigate through a maze. Instead of using arrows on the keyboard, they created codes to help finish the maze. They can show you this at home by going to www.code.org and signing into their student accounts. The assignment is under Elementary School, Unit 1, lesson 3 and 4. 

4th Grade technology is working directly with Mrs. Brandt to incorporate technology into the curriculum they are working on in the classroom. They are learning about wild weather with Mrs. Brandt and in technology we are finding three credible websites and listing three facts from each website. 4th grade is also continuing to work on their daily google search logs! Ask them about it :)

5th/6th Grade learned in depth about algorithms, and how following a list of steps can help them finish a task. They learned how computers re program lists of information into a code that helps the computer run a specific program. They began by using graph paper to convert algorithms into a code. Students will continue working through our coding unit for the remainder of quarter 3! Look for the Graph Paper Algorithm coding sheets we did this week in Tech! 

7th/8th Grade has started their coding unit by problem solving. Often times in technology, we have a problem arise and students are unsure of how to find a solution. We began problem solving in a series of activities including: Creating a seating chart for a birthday party where certain people can sit with each other and certain people can not sit next to each other. They also worked on planning a road trip. Students worked independently, and then in groups to complete these activities. As we completed these problem solving activities, students reflected on problems they encountered and the problem solving process they used to arrive at a solution. Look for these, as they have taken them home today :)

ALL Grades will continue working through their individualized Coding Unit for the remainder of 3 quarter. If you have any questions, suggestions, or comments, please feel free to contact me at: 

gkatelyn@Carrollton.k12.mi.us 
or cell phone (call or text available) (619) 204-5691 

Thank you for your continued support! 
Katelyn Gerardi

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