Key points:

• K-12 coding sets students up for success during–and after–school
• Teaching coding and design can lead to tech literacy
• Starting a K-12 classroom drone program
• For more news on K-12 coding, visit eSN’s STEM & STEAM page

K-12 coding can completely change learning for students, engaging reluctant learners and activating parts of the brain used for computational thinking, problem solving, and collaboration.

These durable skills are critical for students during their K-12 years, in college, and in the workforce. Let’s take a look at the latest in K-12 coding education:

What are the benefits of teaching coding?

Learning to code can be a game-changer for students, regardless of country. With the hopes of better integrating into the local emerging tech community, Chinese parents prepare their children for code learning before pre-school. And Singapore launched a tailored coding class for primary and secondary school students as early as 2014. India has even introduced coding from class six, based on the country’s new education policy. All of this is based on solid evidence: Computer science students are 17 percent more likely to go to college and have a successful career. Moreover, programming languages such as SQL, Java, JavaScript, C#, and Python are increasingly important to master regardless of profession or industry. The value of learning how to code isn’t only in the skill itself; it’s in the way of thinking, and that transfers to many other subjects. We won’t go into 10 reasons why coding is important, but we will show you why it’s an essential skill.

Why is coding in the K-12 classroom important?

Coding and robotics can help students develop critical skills for success after high school, highlighting the importance of coding in real life. Introducing students to coding and robotics gives them early exposure to STEM in general. This early exposure, according to research, is key to the future of the workforce. Aside from the cool factor K-12 coding and robotics offers, students will learn a number of skills they’ll take with them well into adulthood, including creativity, problem solving, and the ability to fail without quitting. These skills stick around even if students don’t pursue STEM-related study paths or careers later in their lives. Coding and robotics can be introduced in any subject, with a little creativity. Click through for 6 tools to help students develop these valuable STEM skills.

How are student benefited by learning coding?

Coding doesn’t always happen in typical ways. When coding for K-12 merges with storytelling, you have story coding, in which students use computational skills and design thinking as they demonstrate creativity across core curricular areas. Story coding–combining storytelling and coding–helps students develop critical skills. Story coding involves using computer programming to retell stories–students might summarize a story, write original stories, or use programming to create alternative endings to well-known stories. Learn more about how teachers can use story coding to bring history, science, world languages, ELA, and even math into their lessons.

Why is coding important for youth?

Students need programming skills for today and for the future. Many educators believe that all students need to have some programming experience in their life as the world is moving towards more automation. Simply having basic coding fundamentals is going to become more important to these youngsters, and we know that. The gamification of learning is one of many fun ways to learn coding and is a great way to teach technical topics that some students would naturally shy away from. Students cannot wait to show up, start programming, and start solving problems. It’s work, but because it’s fun, it just doesn’t feel like work to them. Here are 5 reasons to start a coding program in your district.    

How can I teach myself basic coding?

Coding is a necessary skill in today’s world, but it is relatively challenging to master, especially for kids. Its complexity is not necessarily because it is incomprehensible, but because it is a new concept for most students. This is especially the case for students in inner-city schools where technology is inevitably scarce due to systemic factors beyond the students’ control. With numerous programming languages available, it can take time to pick a starting point. Educators have found a solution to this problem: gamification. Platforms like CoderZ offer virtual programming services where children can learn code through games. These games make learning code both fun and engaging for kids. Through the CoderZ Robotics curriculum, kids learn to create, manage, and communicate with cyber robots in a virtual setting by inputting code. Block code is used because it is easier for children to understand and execute instead of complex text-based code. Learning is more accessible because virtual robots do not require hardware, space, or other associated costs. Learn more about online coding classes for kids.

Key points:

• Students don’t need one-to-one device access to learn robotics concepts
• A playful and project-based approach to robots works best with younger students
• See related article: Robotics plays a key role in early STEM education

As part of our educational outreach to the community, PBS Reno createdCuriosity Classroom for preschool through 4th-graders. The program, which is free to schools and districts, uses on-air, online, and print resources to help parents, caregivers, and childhood educators prepare children for success.

As we were researching trends in STEAM education to update our program, we noticed that robots were at the forefront, but most of the opportunities only existed for middle and high school students. Here’s how we’re bringing robots to younger students in rural communities.

Bringing robots to the underserved communities

Curiosity Classroom is active in seven counties in rural Nevada. Much of that area is very rural. One of the things that makes us proud of this program is the fact that we are able to bring this technology to students who don’t necessarily have a lot of opportunities to interact with something like a robot. And we don’t just bring one robot to show them and then give them each five minutes to play with it. Every student has their own robot to work with throughout the program.

No one is ever excluded for financial reasons, just as anyone can access PBS on-air programming free of charge. We serve kids wherever we can within our service area, regardless of whether they are in a public school, private school, charter school, parochial school, or even part of a homeschooling cooperative.

PBS Reno is unique in this service delivery model.  Each PBS station decides what its educational outreach programs will look like. We’re proud to be able to reach so many students in diverse educational contexts.

A robot for every student

Our lessons are taught by a team of approximately 40 facilitators, most of whom are retired teachers who get paid for their time. Among them, they have 225 robots to take on the road. We use robots called KIBOs, which are specifically designed for children as young as 4—and which, importantly, don’t require students to have a computer. Instead, students program the robot by arranging a series of wooden blocks with commands printed on them and they scan the sequence, telling the robot what they want it to do.

The lessons, which are all designed to meet our state standards, take approximately 45-60 minutes. We have two lessons for each grade from preschool to 4th. Having two lessons allows a facilitator to go to a particular classroom one day to provide a workshop, and then come back later to build on their knowledge with the second lesson. Each lesson includes a read-aloud to tie in literacy, a PBS video clip, and then hands-on activities.

Since there are so few opportunities for young students to interact with robots, and especially for the rural students we serve, it’s really important that they each get to use their own robot during the lessons. We want every child to get their hands on a robot and practice some coding.

Engaging families, too

To keep the learning going after our two visits, every lesson includes an at-home activity for students to do with their family. For example, the KIBO programming blocks are all printed with simple instructions like move forward, turn right, or turn left, so a take-home activity might be for kids to take cards home with similar instructions so they can “program” a family member who has to do exactly what the cards say. They can direct their parents and siblings to do the hokey pokey!

We also try to bring caregivers and siblings in on the fun with family nights, which have been a great success. The screen-free programming is great for these events because many rural schools don’t have enough computers for everyone to use one. With the block-based programming, no matter how remote we are and how few computers are available, everyone can take a shot at teaching KIBO to dance.

We find this playful, project-based approach to robotics works really well for young students. A lot of the robotics programs for older learners tend to be more competition-based. We’re focused more on helping students understand just what makes a robot a robot, how it takes commands, and other basic coding questions. We hope that by helping students and their teachers work through these ideas, they’ll both be more comfortable with the underlying concepts when they move on to more advanced robots, including the competitive ones.

During the 2021-2022 school year, we held 787 workshops serving about 20,000 students—and the program is growing, mostly by word of mouth among teachers who see how it expands their students’ horizons. As we’ve done activities related to the Mars Rover, for example, we’ve seen that a lot of little kids don’t realize that a robot can’t think for itself. That’s a really basic thing that adults know, but it blows little kids’ minds that they have to tell the robot what to do. They see these big robots out in the world, and then they’re so excited when we help bring them to their level.

Related:
Why educational robotics is a critical STEM learning tool
How robotic gamification helped my elementary students love STEM

While many think of high school students engaged in mechanical engineering or robotics competitions when they hear the word “robotics,” the subject naturally lends itself to learners of all ages—including very young students.

In this episode of Innovations in Education, hosted by Kevin Hogan, you’ll hear from Jason Innes, Director of Curriculum, Training and Product Management at KinderLab Robotics, Inc., discuss why robotics is an excellent way to introduce young learners to coding, computational thinking, and design principles.

Engineering is a critical part of STEM education, and engineers play a role in creating, improving, and maintaining some of today’s most valued and essential things, from smartphones and airplanes to zippers and roller coasters.

This year, Engineers Week celebrates “Creating the Future,” and it emphasizes the vital role engineers play in creating innovative solutions to some of the world’s most pressing problems and biggest challenges. Highlighting engineering also encourages students to pursue engineering classes and, potentially, engineering career paths.

When students become interested in STEM at a young age, their critical thinking, collaboration, creativity, and communication skills have a chance to thrive. Sustaining that interest is important, too, particularly because girls and underrepresented minority groups quickly lose interest in STEM learning–and never regain motivation to pursue it.

Because STEM is not a standalone, core academic subject, it’s implemented differently all over the country. Ultimately, through STEM learning, students should have the opportunity authentically apply their learning to solve real-world problems.

STEM is often introduced in middle and high schools, but by that time, many students have already avoided it, said Jason McKenna, director of Global Educational Strategy at VEX Robotics and author of What STEM Can Do for Your Classroom: Improving Student Problem Solving, Collaboration, and Engagement, Grades K–6.

Early STEM exposure–and successes or failures in STEM learning–can often make or break a child’s willingness to participate in STEM learning. Educational robotics can turn this downward trend around by incorporating all aspects of STEM in an engaging way that helps students reach success in problem-based learning challenges early on. This motivates students to tackle more difficult challenges.

“Students as young as 6 and 7 form an opinion about their proficiency in STEM subjects, and once that opinion is formed, it becomes very difficult to change,” he said. “Our job is to arm teachers with tools so they can introduce young students to authentic, engaging, fun activities. Now students can see themselves as someone in a STEM field–now they have the capability to do one of these STEM subjects.”

Educational robotics bridges the gap between rigid lessons and lessons that are too unstructured to motivate students, McKenna said. VEX Robotics leans heavily into the idea of guided problem solving–the idea that students have enough structure to understand their challenge or task, but enough space to explore different solutions.

Teachers ensure students have the background knowledge to begin the challenge and they set expectations for what success looks like. As students move through a challenge and the problem-solving process, teachers take away some scaffolding that was in place in earlier stages. Students can achieve their goal in different ways, trying different approaches and processes.

“You want a level of guidance and structure, and as students progress, you slowly take that scaffolding away and allow students to apply creative solutions to the problem,” he said.

This type of STEM exploration helps students realize that they can be STEM students.

“There’s no such thing as a math brain or a reading brain. We can become good at anything if we put enough time towards it,” McKenna said.

Related:
How computer science education bridges the digital divide

Amid the havoc that the pandemic wreaked on our lives, there were important lessons to be learned. It proved that people skilled with technology could navigate and succeed, and that many of the potential problems of the future could be solved by technology.

Many institutions and people who embraced technology survived–and in some cases, thrived.  But for those without digital skills or access to a computer and an internet connection, it was a very different story.

During the pandemic, the term ‘homework gap’ was used to describe children without reliable or any access to the internet and appropriate digital devices and who were unable to complete their assignments. At the beginning of the pandemic, an estimated 15 million public school students in the US lacked the connectivity needed for online learning. This gap was especially pronounced in low-income, Black, and Hispanic households. As nearly every school adopted some form of online learning, students without computers and connectivity suffered. Schools worked hard to address this situation, but for others, they could only watch their students struggle and fall behind.

In an increasingly digital world, not having technology skills can drastically reduce your options in life. Computer science has the potential to level this playing field and prepare students for the future.  While the easiest entry point for schools is offering programming classes, the subject encompasses a wide range of areas. We use Computer science to visualize and analyze data, design, and develop complex, yet intuitive, visual interfaces for digital tools. Ultimately, we approach the problems and ideas of life with a mind honed for computational thought; decomposing ideas into smaller steps, thinking about the problem in both specific and general forms, looking for and simplifying patterns, and ultimately creating a dynamic solution.

It seems incredible that in this context, teachers like me are still having to fight to teach computer science in their schools. It remains a subject that only half of high schools teach and just 5 percent of students study.

There are complex reasons for this. Because computer science is not mandatory in the vast majority of US states (required in only five), it demands teachers who are already passionate and educated in the subject to advocate that coding classes be taught. Not all teachers are comfortable teaching computer science if they don’t have the skills themselves. Finally, affordability is a major barrier. Between software licences and acquiring the proper hardware, teaching computer science can be very expensive. 

These challenges are real, but they are not insurmountable. Indeed, our education system has no choice but to adapt. I often tell my students, “I’m not preparing you to solve the opportunities of today, I’m helping you prepare to solve the unimaginable opportunities of your tomorrow.” If we want to build the technically skilled workforce that the future demands and prepare young people to succeed, technology skills must be a top priority.

In my local Connecticut, schools are answering the call.  Today, the Connecticut Computer Science Dashboard states 92 percent of Connecticut students have access to computer science courses or curricular learning opportunities and 88 percent of Connecticut districts are offering some form of computer science course.

Despite the availability of courses, only 12 percent of Connecticut students are taking them. We needed to make computer science accessible and appealing for everyone.

Teaching through game design

Like other CSTA chapters, CSTA Connecticut was established as a local computer science community. We work to connect computer science teachers, provide professional development, and share the latest best practices in K-12 computer science education.

To entice students into trying computer science, we worked with our schools to widen the range of courses available. Being a lifelong player of games, both board and electronic, I wanted to create a video game class. We now run two courses: ‘Introduction to game design’ and ‘Advanced game design.’ The first one is decidedly a ‘platformer’ course, where every student is required to figure out how to build a traditional ‘platform’ game in Construct 3. The advanced course, however, is organized like a real-world game studio. Each student chooses a role such as coder, artist, musician, game designer and producer. The game teams then work together to create whatever style of game that each team collectively chooses to make.

This intuitive way to approach game development is proving to be exceedingly beneficial to students with special educational needs and to multi-language learners. Construct 3 is simple enough for learners who are newer to coding, but holds greater functionality for advanced courses, allowing students to develop at their own speed, and to go far.

Inclusion

In 2022, only 24 percent of Connecticut students participating in a computer science course identified as female.  Additionally, just 11 percent Identified as Black, 19 percent Hispanic, and 0.1 percent were Native American.

Students from underrepresented backgrounds need extra encouragement to try computer science and reap equal benefits from computing skills. Dispelling stereotypes has proven essential, as many students, especially girls, still believe that computer science ‘isn’t for them,’ ‘that’s for boys,’ or because ‘it’s too hard’ and ‘only involves sitting at a computer screen.’

Once students learn that computer science can also lead to a career in things like entrepreneurship, automotive design, healthcare, music journalism, fashion, or sports analysis, they may be more receptive to the career opportunities that come with computer science and offer them an escape from their current reality. Because these career opportunities are so wide, computer science can and should support greater diversity, equity, and inclusion. With the right skills, any student could almost walk out of school and into a highly lucrative career.

Introducing teachers to computer science

Considering the limited definition of computer science and its largely optional status, schools depend on teachers who are personally interested in coding. The competence of the untrained computer science teachers in our state was remarkable, and I wanted to help them take their courses to the next level. Exploring options for game development, I found Construct 3 to be the clear winner. Its intuitive user interface combines both block-based and text-based programming, so students can switch between the two as they progress. This makes it ideal for both students who have never seen a line of code and highly competent developers in upper high school grades. Its intuitive functionality means that teachers with no prior experience can also jump in and work with the students.

Digital divide

Our computer science courses needed to be accessible to all students, including those without connectivity or a sophisticated device. We’ve been able to bridge this digital divide by seeking an accessible platform: Construct 3 can be downloaded for use offline and can run on inexpensive Chromebooks. This helps eliminate the homework gap by giving every student the opportunity develop their skills, irrespective of their household income.

Organizations

Organizations such as the National Center for Women in Technology and our own local higher education institutions are also closing these opportunity gaps through various scholarships and affordable courses.

In addition to formal academic training, many schools and libraries will be have hosted an ‘Hour of Code’ during National Computer Science Education week from December 5th. These fun and casual events give children a taste of being creative with technology. Websites like Code.org will hosted free online coding challenges and CyberStart America ran a free online cybersecurity competition for high school aged students.  Our own Lt. Governor’s Computing challenge offers many levels of entry for grades 3 through 12. Participating in an Hour of Code or online competition is a brilliant way for schools to test the waters of what a computer science course can look like.

Inequality in the US will not disappear overnight. To bridge the ‘homework gap’ and give disadvantaged students an equal opportunity for success in the modern world, schools must be able to teach them computer science. Every student should finish the school knowing not just how to consume with technology, but also how to create with it. By showing students the joy of mastering tech and programming, they will enter adulthood hungry, and ready to seize all the opportunities of the digital revolution.

Related:
How we created a computer science curriculum in 5 steps
How one educator made computer science a “must” during COVID

Coding is a necessary skill in today’s world, but it is relatively challenging to master, especially for kids. Its complexity is not necessarily because it is incomprehensible, but because it is a new concept for most students. This is especially the case for students in inner-city schools where technology is inevitably scarce due to systemic factors beyond the students’ control.

With numerous programming languages available, it can take time to pick a starting point. Educators have found a solution to this problem: gamification. Platforms like CoderZ offer virtual programming services where children can learn code through games. These games make learning code both fun and engaging for kids.

Through the CoderZ Robotics curriculum, kids learn to create, manage, and communicate with cyber robots in a virtual setting by inputting code. Block code is used because it is easier for children to understand and execute instead of complex text-based code. Learning is more accessible because virtual robots do not require hardware, space, or other associated costs.

I used the CoderZ League platform to help my students develop basic coding skills as they played their way through entertaining bite-sized missions. Once I saw how they possessed both drive and tenacity, they participated in a virtual robotics competition–the Fall 2022 CoderZ League Robotics Competition. The competition involved simple and complex tasks completed by the robot that the students programmed, such as direction of movement and angles of rotation to instruct the robot on how it should move to complete its mission.

Some of the missions the students completed during this competition:

• Robogolf – Students had to push golf balls into the golf holes. They used protractors in an applied setting to measure the angle the robot had to turn, and measured the distance to determine how far the robot had to move. The angular- and distance-value derived were not always whole numbers. Nonetheless, they had to beat a timer as well, which added to the complexity.
• Disco Blocks – Students had to get their robot to a target. They had to compute by adding, subtracting, multiplying, and dividing. The path they chose determined whether or not they would score as high as possible.
• Maze Madness – Students measured the distance the robot needed to move before it could turn to reach its target. This mission was challenging as the distance was not always a whole number. The value might have been a decimal, which was perfect because we started the school year off learning about decimals in 5^th grade. As such, integrating robotics and coding supplemented the standards-based instruction that was already occurring in my classroom and enabled students to apply the content. Nonetheless, students were exposed to content pertaining to the end-of-year standard of measurement because they needed to measure the distance or angle the robot had to travel. Consequently, on a recent benchmark assessment, students made significant growth within that domain, which is typically seen at the end of the school year after that unit is taught.

Applications

CoderZ League Robotics is founded on using block-based code and game-missions to engage and teach children about programming. Grounded in STEM, these exercises help kids develop computational thinking and technical ability, which improves their real-world problem-solving skills. Students must adapt to complete further missions and challenges, thereby strengthening their resolve and developing skills they can use beyond the classroom setting.

In particular, the CoderZ platform offers a complete curriculum for programming cyber robots. Educators who wish to teach coding can do so even if they are not skilled in programming or robotics. All they have to do is follow the curriculum and learn with their students. However, this is also limiting because educators cannot create new challenges for students to complete. They must stick to what is provided on the platform. Nevertheless, it is an engaging experience that helps introduce children to complex concepts in a fun way.

Programming: Efficiency, Automation, Replicable Actions

I found the CoderZ virtual robotics program to be an excellent teaching tool due to its carefully curated platform. A high-quality program should contain features that enhance its efficiency, automation, and replicable actions.

Related:
6 tools to help kids learn coding and robotics
This teacher uses story coding to spark creativity and collaboration

This program fulfills these criteria in the following ways.

• Efficiency – Code efficiency refers to the dependability, speed, and programming technique used to develop an application’s code. It is the most critical factor in ensuring peak performance as it minimizes resource consumption and completion time. On CoderZ, any changes to the code are reflected immediately on the simulation pane. This gives the students instant feedback on their projects.
  
• Automation – Automation uses technology to complete tasks with as little human interaction as possible. In computing, it is typically accomplished through a program, a script, or batch processing. Students learn automation on CoderZ as they can input code that operates the virtual robots without further manipulation.  Automation simplifies the processes, making it easier for the machine to complete repetitive tasks.
  
• Replicable actions – This term defines a sequence of actions that enables the efficient use of limited resources while reducing unwanted variation during program development and execution. CoderZ achieves this by color-coding its command-blocks making it easier for kids to identify patterns in the code. This differentiation enables inclusion among diverse learners (i.e., students with special needs, English Language Learners, etc.).  Replicating tasks using code helps students understand the basis of the simulated action, as they can match parts of the program with the actions they produce.

Block-Based versus Traditional Text-based Programming

In the past, programming involved using a mouse and keyboard to type out text-based code. This can be complex for children, especially when it comes to internalizing syntax. These are the rules that define the structure of a programming language.  Furthermore, traditional input can make programming abstract and challenging for young students who benefit from visual and auditory learning.

Block-based coding has emerged as a tool to introduce students to coding. It allows them to explore these concepts in a friendly environment. These systems use colorful, draggable blocks that simulate coded language. Students choose functions from color-coded categories and combine them in a canvas work area to create a sequenced program. The benefit of block programming applications or websites is that the categories are clearly defined. There are blocks for adding specific functions, such as movement, control, and other variables.

However, block-based programming is only useful to a point. Once students are comfortable with block-based code, it is crucial to introduce them to text-based code. While block-based code is fun and engaging, text-based programming languages have real-life applications in computer science.  Educators should let students experience both block-based and text-based coding. When students are ready, they should transition from blocks to text, as text-based code for projects will be the most marketable in the industry.

Other Lessons Learned

The CoderZ virtual robot competition is effective in helping students with STEM learning. However, I was surprised that the program also taught my students practical life-skills as well. They include:

1. Teamwork – The kids worked together to ensure they selected the correct functions for each mission to win. It involved collaborating to figure out the most efficient way to program the robot to complete the missions. The competition cultivated teamwork, which can apply to other activities both inside and outside the classroom as well as ultimately in the workplace.
   
2. Resilience – The missions were not always successful the first time or the way to program the robot was not always straightforward due to time-constraints or terrain, so the kids had to learn how to deal with frustration throughout this competition. In such instances, students had to revise the code as many times as necessary to get it working right. Frustration is a problem they will face when using language-based code because a minor syntax error invalidates the entire code. They are bound to face discouraging moments while learning and in life. This skill strengthened their resilience to such frustration.
   
3. Relationship Building – I built relationships with the kids by leveraging tech, which kids love, and talking about non-school things in this casual setting (i.e., not school or academic). This helps develop the whole child. It also leads to kids wanting to understand complex mathematical concepts like decimal-numbers, angles, patterns, and measurement because they feel as though they are in a safe environment where they can take risks. The notion of “it takes a village” was apparent because of the direct and indirect support from various administrators: Dr. Herbert Blackmon (Principal), Dr. Taylor Greene (Assistant Principal), Minnie Lawson-Cook (Technology Coordinator), Flora Maria Echols (Instructional Coach), Dr. Mark Sullivan (Superintendent), Dr. Gwendolyn Tilghman (Instructional Superintendent), and Dr. Marsha Savage (Learning Operations Specialist).

Next Steps

Now that the months of hard work and the competition has concluded, members of the school and greater community are trying to raise funds for the teams to visit the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. I hope the experience and opportunity will not only broaden their level of exposure, but will continue to encourage them to excel academically and to engage within the field of STEM.

When coding merges with storytelling, you have story coding, in which students use computational skills and design thinking as they demonstrate creativity across core curricular areas.

During an ISTELive 22 virtual session, computer science, robotics, and design thinking educator Paige Besthoff demonstrated how story coding–combining storytelling and coding–helps students develop critical skills.

Story coding involves using computer programming to retell stories–students might summarize a story, write original stories, or use programming to create alternative endings to well-known stories. Teachers can use story coding to bring history, science, world languages, ELA, and even math into their lessons.

Teachers can incorporate story coding into almost any subject area, and computer science concepts help students develop important lifelong skills–such as collaboration, communication, and perseverance–even if they don’t pursue computer science or STEM subjects in college or as a career path.

In fact, using computer science concepts in story coding encourages students to build computational thinking skills through the use of sequences, logic, variables, events, and more. Students also use real-time and creative collaboration as they generate their stories and tackle challenges during that process.

“My students are able to learn about computer science, but in a fun way. Doing it in a cross-curricular manner [means] teachers who aren’t computer science teachers can incorporate it without having to add an additional subject into what they teach,” Besthoff said.

Among the biggest benefits to story coding? In Besthoff’s opinion, it’s how creative students have become.

“One of the main reasons I like story coding so much is that it lets my students become really creative–especially my female students,” Besthoff said. “They don’t always see themselves as programmers, computer scientists, or coders, as much as I stress people in history like Ada Lovelace, the first female programmer. Many of us, when we think about programmers, we think about men, so I want to make sure all my students know it’s available to all of them.”

Combining literacy with coding also helps student populations that may struggle with language, such as ELLs.

How does digital storytelling fit into computer science?

• Encourages creativity
• Gives all students a new way to communicate
• Gives students who have a hard time writing a way to express themselves
• Turns tech-savvy students into co-teachers
• Boosts learning confidence
• Creates a peer-centered learning environments
• Helps ALL students advance
• Creates a powerful exchange of information

Besthoff recommends story coding applications such as Scratch, Google’s CS First, Code.org’s Sprite Lab, Tynker, and Elementari.

Using Code.org’s Sprite Lab, an elementary school student created a digital story about battles in the American Revolution, in which users clicked specific buttons to see and learn more about soldiers. Through Scratch, a student shared a story about their summer vacation and prompted viewers to click through in an illustrated tour of a visit to a family farm.

Besthoff recommends assigning roles to students when they create a digital story in a group:

1. Illustrator: Responsible for layout, design, and drawing the storyboard; chooses which sprites, backgrounds, sounds to use
2. Writer: Writes the text that will be incorporated in the program, what the sprites will say, print blocks, and sprite behaviors
3. Programmer: Responsible for entering the code in the program–this student will use the created storyboard to input the blocks in the code
4. Debugger: Responsible for checking all spelling, making sure the code works, and ensuring the event timing makes sense
5. Sound designer: Coordinates the voiceovers–this role can be combined with another role, or can be separate if groups are large enough

Introducing students to coding and robotics gives them early exposure to STEM in general. This early exposure, according to research, is key to the future of the workforce.

Aside from the cool factor K-12 coding and robotics offers, students will learn a number of skills they’ll take with them well into adulthood, including creativity, problem solving, and the ability to fail without quitting. These skills stick around even if students don’t pursue STEM-related study paths or careers later in their lives.

Coding and robotics can be introduced in any subject, with a little creativity.

Here are 6 tools to help students develop these valuable STEM skills:

1. CoderZ: Grounded in STEM and coding, CoderZ trains students grades 4 and beyond in computational thinking and technical ability. Confronted with real-world problem-solving, students must adapt to advance, strengthening their inner coach and developing the skills they’ll need beyond the classroom.

2. Tinkercad: From Autodesk, Tinkercad is a free web app for 3D design, electronics, and coding that helps educators build STEM confidence in their students through project-based learning in the classroom. Hands-on projects build confidence, persistence, and problem-solving skills.

3. Blockly: Blockly, for Dash and Dot, is a drag-and-drop visual programming tool that introduces children as young as 6 to fundamental programming concepts including Sequencing, Loops, Sensors + Events, Functions, Variables, and Conditionals through creative problem-solving.

4. KIBO: KIBO is an easy and fun way to bring robotics and coding to your young learners and spark their interest in STEAM. This hands on, screen-free robot kit for kids let 4- to 7-year-olds create, design, decorate and bring their own robot to life. When children code with KIBO they are learning invaluable skills that will lead them on the path for success in science, technology, engineering, art, and mathematics (STEAM) skills and future careers.

5. VEX Robotics: VEX Robotics is educational robotics for everyone. VEX solutions span all levels of both formal and informal education with accessible, scalable, and affordable solutions. Beyond science and engineering principles, VEX encourages creativity, teamwork, leadership, and problem solving among groups. It allows educators of all types to engage and inspire the STEM problem solvers of tomorrow. VEXCode VR is a great virtual robotics resource for those without access to physical robotics tools.

6. Blackbird: Blackbird offers cross-curricular coding units for core K-12 classes. The online platform for grades 6-12 makes it possible to teach coding to all students, without electives, train teachers, and hit key CCSS, NGSS, and CSTA standards. Blackbird is browser-based so students can use it with any computer, at school or at home. Teachers can monitor progress, review code, manage classes, and more–all through an easy-to-use platform.

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, school districts across the country have seen an influx of funding for student devices, internet access, and a variety of edtech tools. While equity of access is still a challenge in many communities, this new funding has advanced a unique opportunity for schools to create pathways to computer science education, overcoming some of the challenges that made it inaccessible to many students in the past.

When combined with many states’ adopting new computer science standards, the pandemic has the potential to accelerate K-12 computer science education across the country. Some schools will find it difficult to fit new computer science into an already busy daily schedule.

But there’s a fix! Educators across the country are working on curriculum to integrate computer science into core content areas, alleviating the problem of where to fit a new computer science course into the busy school day. Computer science education is also being used as a tool for gauging social emotional learning. When computing devices become available to all students, it becomes equally important for districts to have a plan for the types of programming environments and platforms students will use as they build CS skills across the grades. Computer science is quickly becoming another tool, like the pencil and paper, that students use to express themselves and to demonstrate mastery of content in unique ways. Here’s where I see these trends going in the new year.

Computer science education will be integrated into the core curriculum.

The move toward 1:1 computers for students has been underway for years, but the pandemic greatly accelerated the trend. Since the school closures that occurred in spring of 2020, many school districts have not only provided students with devices, but also hotspots and other tools to connect to the internet from home.

Giving every student a computer has streamlined the process for providing computer science lessons because there’s no need to schedule time in the school’s only computer lab or to check out devices from a shared computer cart. This practical change has made it easier to incorporate computer science lessons into core subjects taught across the day, like math and language arts.

As more states adopt computer science standards, we’re also seeing innovative curriculum development for CS integrated units, like Code.org’s CS Connections and Coding as Another Language (or CAL) from the DevTech Group at Tufts University. Teachers already have a wide range of demands on their time, so an integrated approach allows teachers to meet core content standards for ELA, math and science, while exposing students to new methods for problem-solving and self-expression through computer science education.

A progression of platforms should be part of a district’s computer science planning.

When I work with districts on their computer science instruction, I emphasize the importance of a TK-5 progression to help students transition through different platforms and devices. I also encourage districts to take advantage of free programming tools, like Scratch Jr. and Scratch, which have a wealth of available lessons and support.

However, computer science instruction for TK-2 students is often neglected, with schools thinking that these students are too young for programming. But the same people who created Scratch Jr. have developed a screen-free programmable robot named KIBO specifically for this age group. KIBO’s wooden programming blocks mirror the digital code blocks used in Scratch Jr., and the robots create a smooth transition as students move from wooden blocks to tablets.

Coding will be used to gauge academic learning and SEL.

I’ve used computer science instruction in a variety of ways in TK-5 classrooms. For example, in kindergarten classrooms, teachers have used KIBO robots in math class to have students demonstrate their understanding of number cardinality by programming the robot to move a specific distance across the carpet. I’ve also helped teachers design lessons to have 2nd-graders program sprites in Scratch Jr. to retell a story from a different character’s point of view. In 5th grade, I worked with students to design web pages in Scratch as an alternative to making slideshows for Native American history projects. In these lessons, students tackled content requirements while investigating CS principles such as sequencing, events, and loops.

In our stressful times, computer programming platforms will be a safe space for students to share how they are feeling in the classroom. It can be challenging for some students to talk about how they feel, especially following traumatic events. For example, a lesson from New York City Public Schools asked students to program an emoji in Scratch to let the teacher know their mood as they returned to school at the beginning of the year. The same thing can be done with any programming platform, including KIBO robots, as students return to classrooms in the new year and beyond. The robot can be decorated and programmed to express a mood, or it can become the class “pet,” adopted, cared for and programmed to share how it’s feeling by a different student each week.

The end goal for computer science education will be access for all students.

As a STEM educator, it has been troubling to see statistics showing that enrollment in AP computer science courses does not often reflect the demographics of school districts. How can we prepare students in lower grades to see computer science courses as an option when they arrive in high school?

No matter what programming platform they use, if we give younger students opportunities to use computer science in a variety of ways, by the time they’re in middle school, they’ll see robotics and computer programming as just another tool they use to tell stories and solve problems that are personally meaningful to them. Many students now have access to computers and the internet for the first time. We have an opportunity and obligation to provide them with the computer science instruction they deserve, and the myriad learning opportunities it offers.

With unpredictability fast becoming our daily bread, what can be more important than preparing the next generations for future challenges? Every parent wants to secure the best foundation for their children, be it for primary school education, academia, work, or life in general. 

In this sense, research has shown us how coding can be relevant across school subjects and academic disciplines. Now it’s time to talk about the other advantages it brings, including the cognitive effects of coding on children’s brains.

This is how coding shapes the future prospects of children.

Coding gives a head start for professional life

Learning to code can be a game-changer for students, regardless of country. With the hopes of better integrating into the local emerging tech community, Chinese parents prepare their children for code learning before pre-school. And Singapore launched a tailored coding class for primary and secondary school students as early as 2014. India has even introduced coding from class six, based on the country’s new education policy.

All of this is based on solid evidence: Computer science students are 17 percent more likely to go to college and have a successful career. Moreover, programming languages such as SQL, Java, JavaScript, C#, and Python are increasingly important to master regardless of profession or industry. The value of learning how to code isn’t only in the skill itself; it’s in the way of thinking, and that transfers to many other subjects.

As coding requires working with different frameworks and programs, mastering it advances experimentation and creativity. It helps with math, arts, writing, and even overall communication, advancing critical thinking and problem-solving. Everyday school tasks can then be handled more seamlessly. And on top of that, coding can be a significant confidence boost for a child, something that is essential at a young age.

The diverse nature of coding further drives a child’s ability to orient themselves in today’s digital economy, IT, technology, and science. And with tech pervading even the most traditional sectors, coding can help secure career opportunities even in finance, retail, healthcare, and more. This is good news as half of all new jobs will require some coding knowledge in the future, together with the fact that 14 to 80 million US jobs are now at risk of being automated. Coding is a vital ingredient to strengthen the new generation of today’s workforce.

Coding literacy: The new language of our world

Coding has the potential to become the language of daily life as any other language. And the data points in this direction, too: The number of data scientists has grown by 650 percent, and the demand for coding is said to grow by 37 percent year-on-year. Learning to code is the skill that will dominate the 21st century, and it’s what we should prepare the younger generation for.

As technology continues to transform the way we live, coders seem to be the best population group equipped to handle the dynamic changes in their private and professional lives. And the sooner the child starts learning, the more they will benefit from the benefits coding brings.

Being able to solve problems by coming up with many solutions to one issue is a typical example of how coding impacts the mind–this is called composition. And as programming involves a lot of repetitive tasks and failures waiting behind every corner, a child can soon learn that there are no shortcuts to getting anything done. Patience and problem solving learned from coding will then certainly serve in real-life situations too.

The effect beyond computer proficiency

The benefits of coding don’t end with getting a high-level tech job. Once a child has reached their goal, that’s when the impacts of learning to code really start to manifest. Coding can serve as an important equalizer, bringing diversity into learning institutions, computing, and computer science. Traditionally plagued by the underrepresentation of certain groups, with factors like gender, race, and income playing an essential part, this can all change now. Even Dan Costolo, the CEO of Twitter, has expressed the need: “A computer doesn’t care about your family background, your gender, just that you know how to code. But we’re only teaching it in a small handful of schools; why?”

Encouraging children, and young girls specifically, to start early and by making coding classes easily accessible, we can achieve many positive long-term effects in our societies, something we are beginning to see already. Coding has become an incredibly valuable asset, presenting an investment parents should make in their children as early as possible. As the language of the digital age, coding is the tool for the future and future generations.

If I had one teaching tool at my disposal in a classroom besides pencils, papers, and books, it would be an educational robot. A robot is the single most engaging learning tool I’ve used with students. It appeals to children of all ages, genders, and backgrounds—and it goes beyond technology to include so many learning goals. In fact, when I was at the pre-K-8 Park School, I considered it one of the most important social-emotional learning tools I’ve used.

There are so many demands on teachers’ time, especially at the beginning of a new school year, that teaching with a robot may not be on their lists of must-do activities. But robotics can be easily incorporated into instruction. As a lead makerspace educator, I’ve found that the best way to help teachers integrate robots into their lessons is to identify the skills they’re looking to teach and demonstrate how they can accomplish it with classroom robots.

As students return to the classroom after a tumultuous and traumatic year, SEL is going to be especially important. Here are a few activities that have helped the teachers in my school connect STEAM and SEL.

Using Simple Challenges to Inspire Complex Social Interactions

I’ve always found math to be a great entry point for introducing robots into early childhood classrooms. When the classroom teacher is doing measurement, we’ll bring out KIBO, a robot we use at our school, and see how far it can go in one “step,” or one forward command.

One of the things I like about this exercise is that it doesn’t require any specialized equipment aside from the robot. KIBO is screen-free, so each team of two or three students gets a robot, the three programming blocks required to accomplish their goal, and a worksheet to help keep them focused.

In science classrooms, I sometimes do something similar, but frame it differently. Instead of asking how far a single robot can go in one step, I’ll ask how far all the robots travel in one step. This often leads to a conversation about ensuring fairness in testing. Then students program their robots, gather measurement data, compare results, and discuss the reasons for the variety in their results.

The robots don’t all travel the same distance with the same forward movement commands, so it sparks a pretty lively conversation. Is it a weak battery? Dirty tires? There are so many variables that affect how far each robot moves, and students get very engaged in figuring them out.

Throughout the whole process, they are talking about fairness, taking turns, dividing up who does which jobs, sharing their findings with teammates, and discussing next steps or what went wrong. With classroom robots, it’s pretty easy to elicit complicated and varied social interactions with quite simple activities.

Discovering the Engineering Design Process through Dragon Dancing

Not long ago, one of my 1st grade teachers was preparing a lesson on dragon dancing and asked if there was some way to incorporate classroom robots. For this one, we gave each student a cardboard topper and a baggie of materials for designing and decorating the topper, which would attach to the robot.

Since they had to share the robot with other students, they not only had to work out between them who got to use the robot and for how long, but they also had to attach their custom toppers to KIBO using the Velcro dots I provided, test their dragon dance, then take them off and go back to the design process if their topper wasn’t secure or if their programming sequence didn’t perform. It was a bit of SEL and the iterative design process all folded up into one activity.

At the end, they put their toppers on their robots, and we had a dragon dancing parade for them to show off their creations and celebrate one another’s success.

Looking to Books—and the World Around You!—for Your Own Design Challenges

When I earned my graduate certificate in engineering education at Tufts University, much of the work I did focused on their Novel Engineering program. This program uses classroom literature—the books kids are already reading—to find new and unique design challenges for students to solve, so I’m pretty partial to robot activities grounded in literature.

One of my favorite books to use in robot lessons is kind of a twist on Novel Engineering because the book it’s based on isn’t standard classroom literature. It’s a book called If I Built a Car, by Chris Van Dusen, and he puts all kinds of fantastical things inside a car. In class, we’ll talk about why he put, for example, a refrigerator in his car. What challenge was he trying to solve?

After we talk about that for a while, students design their own cars, including the wild things they want to include to make a car that’s perfect for them. Attach their wild cars to their robot, and program their car to move about. At the end, we have a parade to show them all off.

Off-the-cuff activities are great, too! Once when I had a few students drop by the makerspace during recess, I put a snack in the corner and told them if they could get the robot to deliver it to them, they could eat it. We spent a good 30 minutes just discussing snack delivery systems as they went around the room pulling out materials to solve their design challenge together.

The Motivation of Being the Boss

One of the things I like to ask students when I introduce them to classroom robots is, “Who wants to be the boss?”

Children don’t have a lot of control over too many things, so being the boss can be a powerful motivator for them. Often, the students who misbehave a bit more, aren’t as eager to do as they’re asked, have trouble sitting still, or who just operate a little differently can have a lot of success with classroom robots where they haven’t had success with other learning tools. I’ve seen teachers absolutely astounded at the results that they’re getting from a social-emotional standpoint.

In the past decade, robotics have evolved from a sci-fi fantasy set in some distant future to an industry capable of producing present-tense toys, companions, workers and self-driving cars. And this is just the beginning. The industry forecast calls for a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of around 26 percent, which would mean a value of $210 billion by 2025.

The inventors (and users) of tomorrow are children sitting in preK-12 classrooms right now, who by and large are not learning about robotics. This represents a huge opportunity for education technology companies. Robots promise to become a bigger part of our daily lives as the industry shifts from being primarily industrial-driven to increasingly consumer-oriented. As they expand beyond the warehouse to wherever we need them, robots will become more diverse, intuitive and useful.

The speed of change has been impressive in recent years and will only accelerate as machine learning and neural networks endow robots with human-like senses, allowing them to “see” and even “taste” like we do.  The skills children learn through robotics could certainly lead to career opportunities later, but that’s not the only reason to embrace the ABCs of androids. In addition to a range of science and math skills, students can practice problem-solving and creativity as well. We’ve arrived at a tipping point in robotics, and for education, that represents lifelong learning opportunities.

Here’s what edtech companies can do to prepare, in terms of both product and platform, for the future needs of today’s students.

1. Grow with students

There are a handful of companies creating strong educational tools in robotics for children, but they mostly target a particular age or stage. What if a robot (or set of robots) could advance as a student does? There is already a spectrum of teaching tools from various companies offering children of different ages the ability to learn about robotics (primarily coding), but how much more powerful would it be if a tool advanced organically with the student as they moved from preschool to high school and potentially even beyond? Just as coding lessons became more advanced, so too could other components of robotics such as engineering, electronics and, eventually, artificial intelligence. The pandemic took an eraser to the chalk line between home and school, so there’s no reason teaching technology shouldn’t follow this trend. Flexibility is key so students can learn at their own pace, when and where they want, for as long as they want.

2. Ignore boundaries

Robots are already being used for social-emotional learning and special education. With this in mind, it’s not far-fetched to imagine they could be employed to help with a wide range of subjects, and the potential can be whatever companies can imagine. Perhaps robots will one day soon “listen” to children read and help pinpoint reading challenges or deliver personalized music lessons for students that have advanced beyond others in their class.

3. Don’t forget mentors

Educators can get intimidated by robotics, but it doesn’t have to be that way. Smart solutions consider teachers and parents alongside students. Prospective teachers or guides must be able to access content and progress in a user-friendly way to provide the educational scaffolding needed for success.

The pandemic created an opening for more technology in the classroom. Teachers were forced to embrace all things digital, and there’s no going back. Likewise, parents became more involved in their children’s education during the pandemic as they facilitated virtual schooling or looked for supplemental online resources to combat learning loss. The users are not just students of all ages but also parents, teachers, tutors and any other educators that support students.

4. Think holistically

Education is changing faster than ever before. Pre-pandemic, educators were already engaged in rethinking not just what we teach but how we teach, and then 2020 brought a whole new perspective to both.

That means there is an opening for edtech companies with the right set of skills to help guide the future of education—a future that understands the growing role of robotics. To address the needs, businesses must combine expertise in content, platform engineering, and user experience design.

In other words, companies must consider not only how and when to deliver the right content at the right age or grade level, but also how to make the technology work seamlessly for every category of user, including students, educators, and parents, as they all progress toward the future. Accessibility and security are prerequisites.

Robots have gotten a bad rap. The mere mention of anything automated brings fears of either our replacement or ultimate demise (see any of the six “Terminator” films). But artificial intelligence and machine learning are, of course, entirely human creations with nearly unlimited power to make our lives better. They’ve already taken on tasks that are dangerous for people and have been developed to help our aging population stay in their homes longer. Rather than worrying about some dystopian future, it makes more sense practically to prepare for a world where people work with robots, in almost every industry and across so many facets of their lives, from school through retirement.

Anyone can learn to build something innovative, if given the right tools. Edtech companies have an important opportunity to advance a field that sits at the intersection of so many valuable STEM concepts and offers so much versatility. Robotics represents an engaging, hands-on way to prepare today’s students to become tomorrow’s creators and agile digital citizens.

In the spring and summer of 2020, Brooklyn Preschool of Science closed down for six months due to COVID-19. During those same six months, almost 300,000 people left New York, so there are certainly fewer families in our zip code than there were in March.

Even so, our independent preschools are back to serving 300 families at three locations, offering in-person classes for students ages 2 to 5. Parents are trusting us with their children not just because of the safety precautions we’re taking, but because of our pedagogical approach, which begins with a spirit of inquiry and ends with students who have a lifelong love of science.

An inquiry-based, hands-on approach

Our schools are rooted in inquiry, in a sense of discovery. We believe that nothing should be taught separately. Reading, writing, math, art, movement—everything should be taught holistically. We’re also huge believers in hands-on learning: we have about 25 different animals in each building to help us teach life science.

Through Carmelo’s experience as a public school teacher for 20 years and our time at BPOS, we’ve seen that a hands-on methodology is especially well suited to science because it puts concepts in context. Students truly learn so much more when they’re able to get their hands dirty and touch everything.

Starting them young

The reason why we saturate the school with so many animals is that you can’t get somebody to love, say, geckos if they’re 11 or 12 if they didn’t have those early experiences when they were 5 or 6. The same is true of teaching skills like robotics, coding, and computational learning. It has to happen early. These are the years to create a passion for science, which also leads to foundational language acquisition at a young age.

For example, we teach our four-year-olds robotics. When we take out the KIBO robot for the first time each October, their eyes light up. It looks like a toy, and they want to touch it. They want to play with it, so they’re more likely to listen to the basic instructions. We start with very simple commands, talking about how it’s a robot that will do things that we tell it to. Then we get into the idea of coding by telling them that robots are all around us. For instance, we explain that when they put their hands under the faucet to wash them, there’s a code in that faucet that tells the water to come out.

Getting parents on board

Since we’ve reopened, we’ve done tons of tours, and when families come into the school and see that we offer coding and robotics with our 4-year-olds—and when they see how we do it—they’re all for it. It’s really fun to see parents be so eager to see the robot. A lot of our families work for Google or Facebook. They’re engineers, so they want their kids to have these experiences. Our goal is to create Renaissance kids. We want to give the kids an opportunity to hit the ground running in all different areas, and then eventually have them carve out who they want to be in life.

Inspiring collaboration

Each of our centers has a table set up for groups of four to five, and each table has one robot. We want our students to share so they get the social-emotional benefit of working together, of building those collaboration skills.

We give them some structure by assigning roles: somebody can be the recorder, somebody can hold the robot, someone can create and design the artwork, and somebody else can handle the blocks they use to program the robot. Robotics teaches our 4-year-olds to work with others, but it also helps each student practice fine motor skills—and, when implemented as part of center-based play, it shows them how art and science go hand-in-hand.

Combining art and science

For Halloween this year, we did a “Five Little Pumpkins” song using five KIBOs. As the song goes along, each pumpkin says, “Oh my, it’s getting late,” and rolls away. We programmed the robots to roll away, used their recording feature to capture the kids’ voices, and also incorporated some art by having them decorate pumpkins and put them on the robots’ art platform. Then we sang the song, and every time it was one of the pumpkins turn to roll away, one of the children would press the button and their robot would roll away while playing their voice recording. It was great seeing the looks on their faces when they realized that they taught that robot to do something just through coding.

Another activity we did this year started with feathers. We had students paint with them to see the differences in the patterns they made. We then dropped the feathers from different heights and gave the kids stopwatches to see which took the longest they hit the floor. So we incorporated math and art, and then the computational thinking aspect came when we converted KIBOs into birds.

The kids decorated the robots with feathers and then, to teach them about migration, we added a map that shows geese flying south to the warmer weather. We spoke about the “V” formation they made, and programmed the robots to “fly” across the room a “V” formation. This led us to talking about how the leader of the pack is the one who helps the other birds, and how they take turns being that leader to make the travel easier and give the other birds lift. So we added a social-emotional lesson, and even some physics.

Looking forward to the spring, we’ll be using KIBO for our unit on simple machines. It’s easy to imagine programming a robot to go up an inclined plane, and we also look forward to finding fun, creative ways to incorporate coding into our unit on plants. We may even incorporate robotics into learning the shapes of letters. So, if we’re learning the letter “P” we’ll have the kids code the robot to actually create that letter.

For us, the beauty of robotics goes back to power of inquiry, to discovering hands-on activities that connect so many different dots and inspire kids to take joy in exploring their world.

At Everett Public Schools, we’ve always had a robotics team at the elementary and secondary levels. Last year we were up to 50 robotics teams within the FIRST organization. During the shutdown, we went into a panic over how students wouldn’t be able to physically “touch” and work on the robots on campus anymore.

I didn’t want to lose our robotics stipend, nor did we want students to miss out on that learning during the shutdown. For help, we started searching for an online platform that would augment our in-person robotics curriculum.

We found what we were looking for in CoderZ and soon after, we shifted our entire robotics curriculum over to that platform. We weren’t sure how many students would want to log in from home voluntarily, but our participation levels have actually grown since the pandemic shut down in-person learning in March 2020.

Here are five reasons why we put energy and effort into creating and growing our coding programs:

1. Students need programming skills for today and for the future. We believe that all students need to have some programming experience in their life as the world is moving towards more automation. Simply having basic coding fundamentals is going to become more important to these youngsters, and we know that.   

2. Teachers needn’t be “techies.” With our online coding platform, you don’t have to be a computer science teacher to be able to teach kids how to code. A lot of our coaches are elementary school teachers who jumped into the platform with ease. As someone who supports teachers on technology—including complex subjects like CAD robotics—having a platform that allows instructors at all levels to jump in, even if they don’t know much about coding, is extremely beneficial.

3. Students love it. The gamification of learning is a great way to teach technical topics that some students would naturally shy away from. Our students cannot wait to show up, start programming, and start solving problems. It’s work, but because it’s fun, it just doesn’t feel like work to them.    

4. Remote isn’t a problem. Coding and building robots can happen in the virtual world just as easily as it takes place in a physical classroom. So even though we can’t always meet in person, CoderZ lets our students continue to learn while we maintain the programming curriculum, all while promoting virtual collaboration and teamwork among our students. It’s definitely a win-win.

5. It gets girls involved with STEM. Offering a robotics curriculum helps us introduce STEM and computer technology early. Right now, for example, we have two teams at each one of our 19 elementary schools. We know through many studies that girls in particular don’t access STEM activities, and they quickly pivot away from them because they don’t recognize the career opportunity. Right now, at the elementary level, our teams are made up of 50 percent girls, if not more.

Our robotics program keeps growing every year as we welcome new students to the club. We’ve expanded to both a fall and spring league, which gives the kids more time to program, code the robots, and gain valuable experience. We’re reaching more of our students and continuing to use tools like CoderZ to enhance our students’ coding and robotics experience.

Technology is ubiquitous in the lives of today’s students. As technology users, students access technology for entertainment, communication, and learning. Tech literacy, which has become as essential as reading, writing, and arithmetic in preparing students for the future, encourages students to move beyond the role of technology consumers to becoming technology creators.

Encouraging technology creators means engaging students in project-based technology courses that introduce them to coding, design, gaming, and animation. And as students complete projects such as developing an app, creating a 3D video game, or designing a collection, they gain relevant, hands-on experience using industry-standard tools professionals use. Students apply creativity, problem-solving, and critical thinking skills–competencies that are important in preparing students for the future and are applicable to any career, whether it’s in technology or not.

While states are adding computer science as a requirement for high school graduation, fewer than half of K–12 public schools are able to offer technology courses. For Wautoma High School in rural Wautoma, Wisconsin, adding technology courses to the high school offering afforded equity of access to an online solution that would otherwise be prohibitive to a smaller district.

According to Wautoma High School Principal Jennifer Johnson, students who are taking the technology courses are very engaged with their learning and are excited about the different technology skills they are able to pursue.

Finding relevant curriculum and educators with the right skill set can present a challenge. Wautoma selected a suite of technology courses that offered students access to online support from experts to complete their projects and coursework successfully. According to Johnson, it’s extremely important for the school to offer this type of technology. As students go off into the world, Johnson wants her students to be well-versed in the technology requirements of the future, whatever their career choices may be.

As technology continues to drive rapid change, some predict that one-third of the American workforce will have to switch to new occupations by 2030, according to a report published by the McKinsey Global Institute (2017).

For students at Wautoma, adding technology courses made it possible to pursue potential career interests and get a taste for specific industry professions—and industry-standard software and tools—well before college, while collaborating with one another on the progress of their project-based learning opportunities.

Johnson said she believes the courses will also provide a better transition for students from high school to college or professional and technical degrees.

The skills and competencies students need to be successful beyond high school are changing. Students must be prepared to be lifelong learners—to be curious, to problem-solve, to persist, to collaborate and to effectively communicate with others. Engaging in creativity, real-world problem solving, and habits of learning will help them become ongoing learners and prepare them for their future. Today, tech literacy has become a requirement as we prepare for that future.

A programming language is math. It’s a system for writing human logic in a way that a computer can work with.

A computer program is a list of instructions written using the programming language’s mathematical system. When a computer runs a program, it’s called software. Because computer software is so important these days, it’s vital that we teach our kids to code.

A programming language is a mathematical tool for creating software. But programming languages are designed for software engineers and professional programmers. They were not built for and are not suitable for middle and even high school introductory courses. If you make a mistake, a programming language will not tell you what it is: It will just sit there, with a cryptic message on the screen (“RangeError: Maximum call stack size exceeded”) and wait for you to fix the problem. How does this apply to learning to code in today’s middle and high schools?

According to pedagogical theory, learning is maximized when the student stays within their comfort zone. They should be asked to follow directions in a carefully limited, “scaffolded” environment. In this environment, the student can make mistakes–but not too many. If they do make a mistake, they get immediate, helpful feedback. Students practice in this scaffolded environment until they are ready to move on to the next step, which involves a little more responsibility. When they have learned enough, they move on to the next stage–and so forth.

Because of these issues, a standard programming language is not useful in the early stages of the learning process.

But…we want students to learn to write computer programs! What can teachers and schools do?

The solution is simple–though not yet in common use.

We need to give students pedagogical versions of programming languages to practice on. This is different from the “real” professional programming language. A pedagogical version of a programming language, whether it be Python, C++ or Javascript, is engineered to be helpful. In their first interaction with these teaching systems, the student is directed to write a single line of code; then another, and another. In a little while, they can run their program, and see the result – a red circle appears on the screen!

Eureka! The student has created software!

As they continue to practice, their programs grow longer and more complex, yet at each stage the student is simply following instructions. If they make a mistake, the computer responds with a simple explanation of the problem. As the student learns more of the language of programming, the instructions grow more complex, and gradually less specific; the student writes more complex programs. The red circle bounces around the screen, changing color as it goes!

Along the way, the students are learning to use a tool similar to the ones programmers use to fix problems in their code. The problems are called “bugs,” and the tool is a “debugger.” In the educational version of their programming language, the debugger they use is more friendly than those used by the pros.

At a certain point, students are ready to progress to a less structured format. With the help of the friendly debugger, they can start to write their own programs – with more flexibility, and less scaffolding – but still a well-defined problem and general instructions for solving it.

Students continue to progress through a scaffolded, safe environment that gradually gives them more responsibility. They learn jargon and techniques, do projects, and work with classmates, creating their own games. At last, after many projects they are ready to learn to work with a “real” programming language–a language made by and for engineers. This is quite an achievement; but given time, all students can do it.

Unfortunately, in high school, the professional (and very unhelpful) programming languages are the system students usually start with. This leads to frustration and a dropoff in high school CS education.

This is all new, and the educational system has done its best to address this sudden need for a subject. Overall, it may be time to step back and ask if our CS pedagogy is up to the standard set by other subjects such as math, foreign language or science. And if it does not, then change is needed–and inevitable.

More K-12 schools are introducing drones into the classroom as educators discover how useful unattended vehicles can be to teach and strengthen science, technology, art, engineering, and mathematics (STEAM) skills. Students are engaged by the possibility of flying robots in their classrooms, but teachers will require support systems to understand how to best implement a classroom drone program.

Before investing in the hardware, K-12 educators can take essential steps to enhance their drone program’s success in getting off the ground.

Consider the drone objective for your classroom

Decisions about drones and drone curriculum should be based on the students who will be learning with the drones and on the learning objectives educators hope to achieve.

Before purchasing a drone, educators should identify the need, audience, and purpose of the program, including goals for student engagement, course achievement, and objectives.  

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) offers a starting point here.

4 things to consider

Licensing: Teachers should consider acquiring a license as FAA Part 107–certified remote pilot to ensure they understand the safety and all the rules and regulations on drones. The certification is not required by the FAA for educational use.

Safety: Teachers should learn where drones can and cannot be flown to help maintain safe airspace for all involved. We are responsible for flying with the FAA guideline and regulations.

Picking a drone: In choosing the right drone to meet course or program objectives, teachers should ask questions like: 

• Where will you be flying?
• Is there enough space to fly the size drone you have looking to fly?
• Does the drone have to be registered with the FAA because of its size?
• How many drones per student are needed?
• Is there an age requirement for the drone selected?
• What type of media quality might be required?

Support staff: Teachers should also build a support staff in and outside of the school, including:

Drone pilots and experts: Developing relationships with local drone pilots would be beneficial to help with the guidance regarding rules, laws, and regulations. Forming an advisory board of drone experts can be very helpful.

IT department: Gaining the IT department’s support helps with software and devices used to control the drones. It’s good to ensure that students can access all the software, computers, and networks required to participate in the program.

Creating a budget

When starting a drone program, your budget should be centered around your objective. Your budget should consider not only the drones and curriculum but also should include things such as (but not limited to):

• Drones (UAS Units)
• Software
• Controls (mobile devices)
• Maintenance such as batteries and propellors
• Insurance for drones
• FAA licensing
• Challenge and mission materials such as hoops, loops, and landing pads

Funding for educators can be minimal, but there are ways to fund a classroom drone program through classroom drone grants, STEM grants and local businesses.

Benefits of drones in the classroom

In previous years, drones were restricted to sci-fi or were products of thoughts of things to come. Today, Unmanned Aircraft Systems or drones are quickly turning into a piece of our regular day-to-day existence.

With drones used in agriculture, filmmaking, conservation, search and rescue, military operations, and energy infrastructure, an introduction to drone technology will help prepare students for the future. A classroom drone program can help teach students firsthand how drones can be useful in teaching, learning, research, and as a service to society.

Drone activities can be used across curriculums. Examples of classroom drone activities include:

• Science: Studying the different types of landscapes and environmental features
• Math: Studying measurements by estimating and measuring units of length
• Language Arts: Studying traffic safety in the community; students create narrative essays on the traffic in the community.

In the 1400s, sons of good families were sent to be taught Latin by the Church. The monks who taught them weren’t trained as educators, and they made heavy use of corporal punishment. So it wasn’t much fun to learn to read back then.

In this period, no one assumed that everyone needed to be able to read–quite the contrary. Reading was for religious purposes and learning to read English was seen as unnecessary at best, heretical at worst.

But people who knew how to read and write English were guaranteed a spot in the new middle class. Businesses, now springing up in the towns, needed literate people to work in offices, reading and writing contracts, invoices, rules, and regulations. The Church thought that learning to read English was a waste of time–Scripture was all that mattered. But they just didn’t see what was coming. English was the language of business, and capitalism would soon replace the feudal economic system.

By the mid-1700s, a majority of the English population could read, and literacy was increasing quickly. The Industrial Revolution followed soon after: Once people generally could read, the potential was there for a whole new type of workforce.

I think we’re now going through a phase a lot like the beginning of the Renaissance, which is why I think we need to teach all the kids to code.

I know, it may sound crazy. An administrator at the Oregon Board of Education put it this way: “Not everyone is going to be a programmer, just like not everyone is going to be a mechanic. It would be like requiring everyone to take auto shop.”

Sure, right now, today, in 2021, you don’t need to know how to write Python or Javascript to participate in the job market. It’s helpful if you do, and you can make more money, but there are jobs for you without it.

But wages are stagnating–unless you work with information. Jobs that pay well tend to require the ability to work with data and computer systems — and this is more and more the case every year. Before long, the middle class will be working primarily with data, code, AI, and machinery; people without those skills will gradually find themselves sharing a thinner and thinner slice of the pie.

Not everyone needs to be a software engineer, but basic skills with coding and data are a much lower bar; just as during the Renaissance, you didn’t need to write a book to work in an office–you just had to be able to read an inventory.

This new workforce will enable us to aggressively pursue promising technologies such as synthetic biology, nanotechnology, AI, automated systems such as self-driving cars, and many others. This, in turn, is likely to lead to a new technological age.

So where does this leave us? We’re trying to teach kids to code, but it’s not working.

Learning to code is often a truly painful experience, even though it ought to be fun. It’s not much of an exaggeration to say that code learning might as well be taught in Latin (students see the same error messages that engineers see–and these messages are not at all understandable to laypeople).

We’re still at the very beginning of the shift towards the information economy. Only a tiny fraction of our population can code, and a few more people are comfortable working with data.

The literacy rate is maybe…3 percent?

In summary:

• Only a small percentage of Americans can write a computer program or an SQL query.
• Coding is taught by a close-knit ingroup of specialists (like a priesthood) who are not primarily trained as educators.
• Coding is often seen as not important for young people to know, despite abundant evidence to the contrary.
• Coding is made unnecessarily difficult to learn.

The parallel with English language literacy in the Renaissance should be clear enough. There are some important differences, however:

• We have a lot of schools and teachers, even if they don’t effectively teach coding just yet.
• Society and technology are changing much more quickly now than in the 1400s.

Because of these differences, I’d expect it to take much less than 300 years (maybe 50 years?) before a majority of Americans can code. But I suspect we’ll see a similar kind of revolution: Once more than half the people can code, the economy will be transformed by rapid technological change.

That revolution on the horizon may look threatening, as the Industrial Revolution was, with automation taking over many of the jobs being done by people today. But it’s coming–and I think we should try to make sure the benefits extend to underserved groups as much as possible. To make that happen, we need to stop teaching in Latin–that is to say, we need to make it easier and more fun to learn to code.

Technology is ubiquitous in the lives of today’s students. As technology users, students access technology for entertainment, communication, and learning. Tech literacy, which has become as essential as reading, writing, and arithmetic in preparing students for the future, encourages students to move beyond the role of technology consumers to becoming technology creators.

Encouraging technology creators means engaging students in project-based technology courses that introduce them to coding, design, gaming, and animation. And as students complete projects such as developing an app, creating a 3D video game, or designing a collection, they gain relevant, hands-on experience using industry-standard tools professionals use. Students apply creativity, problem-solving, and critical thinking skills–competencies that are important in preparing students for the future and are applicable to any career, whether it’s in technology or not.

While states are adding computer science as a requirement for high school graduation, fewer than half of K–12 public schools are able to offer technology courses. For Wautoma High School in rural Wautoma, Wisconsin, adding technology courses to the high school offering afforded equity of access to an online solution that would otherwise be prohibitive to a smaller district.

According to Wautoma High School Principal Jennifer Johnson, students who are taking the technology courses are very engaged with their learning and are excited about the different technology skills they are able to pursue.

Finding relevant curriculum and educators with the right skill set can present a challenge. Wautoma selected a suite of technology courses that offered students access to online support from experts to complete their projects and coursework successfully. According to Johnson, it’s extremely important for the school to offer this type of technology. As students go off into the world, Johnson wants her students to be well-versed in the technology requirements of the future, whatever their career choices may be.

As technology continues to drive rapid change, some predict that one-third of the American workforce will have to switch to new occupations by 2030, according to a report published by the McKinsey Global Institute (2017).

For students at Wautoma, adding technology courses made it possible to pursue potential career interests and get a taste for specific industry professions—and industry-standard software and tools—well before college, while collaborating with one another on the progress of their project-based learning opportunities.

Johnson said she believes the courses will also provide a better transition for students from high school to college or professional and technical degrees.

The skills and competencies students need to be successful beyond high school are changing. Students must be prepared to be lifelong learners—to be curious, to problem-solve, to persist, to collaborate and to effectively communicate with others. Engaging in creativity, real-world problem solving, and habits of learning will help them become ongoing learners and prepare them for their future. Today, tech literacy has become a requirement as we prepare for that future.

When our school shut down in March, initially, it was for a two-week period. I thought, “Well, this isn’t too bad, we can do a few coding activities from Code.org or maybe put together some Google Slides presentations for when we return.”

Then, two weeks turned into the end of April and my plan had to change.

As the technology teacher in our district, I felt I was adept at communicating with my students online (we are a Google Apps for Education school, and I’ve been a Google Classroom user since its beginnings), but I knew others in our district weren’t quite as tech savvy. I put together a few tutorial videos on how to use Google Classroom, Google Meet, and Zoom for our staff members to use to reach out to their students.

Related content: 3 key parts of a coding and robotics program

As April turned into May, the likelihood that we would be returning to school dropped substantially. Virtual graduations, meal deliveries, and Google Meets became the new normal–a phrase I quickly came to despise. As I’m sure many of you educators out there would agree, we concluded our school year, but it felt like we never really finished.

Since then, we’ve had virtual staff meetings, listened to our elected leaders try to make informed and well-intended guidelines and recommendations, and witnessed some amazing acts of humanity. As more information becomes available, it is clearer and clearer that plans need to be made for the “just in case” scenario occurring again during the 2020-2021 school year.

Teaching coding, robotics, and CAD this school year requires a bit more planning this summer than I am accustomed to doing. Our district will continue utilizing the Google Education Suite (Classroom, Meet, Chat, Docs, etc.) for communicating with our students. The folks at Code.org have really done a fantastic job at creating a comprehensive coding curriculum for students, so I want to continue utilizing that to introduce coding in my “virtual” classroom.

The physical component

However, learning to code was always reinforced for me with a physical component, which is why I absolutely love teaching robotics–seeing my program in action with a robot driving forward and moving an object just made more sense to me and my kinesthetic learning style. Kinesthetic learners feel the same way.

I had been teaching using the LEGO Mindstorms EV3 system in my junior high classes my first three years at LaBrae, when I approached our superintendent and shared with him my vision of expanding our course offerings and taking our afterschool robotics club to the next level. After researching solutions, I concluded that the TETRIX MAX solution from Pitsco Education was the next logical progression for our district due to compatibility with the LEGO system as well as the capability to scale up our build projects.

At the beginning of this past school year, I was elated to learn that my district would be purchasing PRIZM controllers, as well as the new TeleOp Modules, for each of our TETRIX MAX kits. This ushered in a whole new level of capabilities for our robotics classes. When word got out that we were using PlayStation 4 controllers in class on our robots, we had teachers and students alike peeking their heads in Room 929 to ask if they could try them out!

Coding and robotics online

So, what will teaching robotics and coding look like in 2020-2021? My plan is to introduce my students to the PRIZM Learning Module (PLM), a rectangular station I created that utilizes multiple motors, servos, distance sensor, line finder sensor, and the blinking LED lights of the PRIZM controller into a single learning station. If we start the school year in a face-to-face scenario, I plan to have the students build the PLM so that I can show best building practices using the TETRIX system, cable/wire management, and creating a wiring guide.

The PLM will serve as a springboard to coding, as many of my HS students will be first-time robotics students and will be using the text-based programming in the Arduino IDE for the first time. If our district moves forward with a hybrid approach of in-person and at-home learning, or if a resurgence occurs and forces schools to close again, students will be able to continue working and creating their code at home.

Once students feel they have successfully completed the code, they can either email the file to me or upload it in an assignment in our Google Classroom page. Then, I will be able to take their program and demonstrate the code on a PLM I will bring home with me, and I can share the results via video chat.

As we progress out of the PLM and into building the RangerBot basic driving robot from the Engineering Mobile Robotics Curriculum Pack and the BeeDee design from the Coding Essentials Curriculum Pack, students will be able to create programs for the challenges from the curriculum packs, and I can again demonstrate with them their solutions on identical fields I plan to have both in my classroom and in my basement here at home.

We are also looking to get our hands on the new Tello EDU drone kits available now from Pitsco, though I am not sure my dogs will be big fans of them buzzing around the house as my students take their coding skills to the skies!