Papercraft with Kindergarten and First Grade

 The Kindergarten and first grade classes have spent their last trip through the STEM Lab working on some creative paper crafting. Most of the week was spent creating basic origami models. I have taught origami before, but never to students this young. I confess to not being sure how well this would go, but the children far exceeded my hopes with their skill, creativity, and perseverance when they faced challenges. 

Our first model was a cat. There were so many fantastic creations!

Next we made dogs.

We switched gears a bit for our next model. First we decorated our paper squares and then we folded them into tulips. Students drew vases with flower stems in them and then attached their flowers to create a 3D work of art.

All of the origami links are from redtedart.com.

After a few days of origami we did something completely different and made animations following a guide for 2 page flipbooks from the Tinkering Studio at the Exploratorium. These were all completely amazing and the students were so excited by what they made.

Check back soon to see what the other grades are up to these days in the lab!

What We Have Been Up To In the STEM Lab

 What a year it has been thus far in the STEM Lab. Despite my best intentions to keep up with this blog, the fast pace brought on by 1 week rotations (rather than 2 week), and the challenges of teaching both in person and virtual students simultaneously, defeated me.

We have been busy as usual in the lab (which is to say on a cart that I have been pushing around the school since October). Here's the short version of what has been going on with the STEM Lab.

Computer programming

As always, developing computer programming skills is an important element of our practice. Coding helps build critical problem solving and algorithmic thinking strategies. My approach in the lab places equal emphasis on instilling a sense of creative confidence in the students. I want them to thinking of programming not as an activity, but as a tool they can employ to share their learning and express their ideas. 

Kindergarten, first, and second grades have been using Code.org and Scrach Jr while the third through fifth graders have been using Scratch. 

Math Stories and Math Art Challenges

Kindergarten and first grade recently finished up an unit on math stories. Each day we read a book that combined literature and a math concept. Following the book students completed a an activity related to the book's theme. 

Earlier in the year, all of the students in Kindergarten through fifth grade enjoyed a unit of math art challenges. This unit was a playful exploration of the connections between mathematics and art. We looked at elements of geometry and probability along with patterns. Most of the math art challenges were adapted from a project maintained by Annie Perkins on her website: #MathArtChallenge. Many of these are geared towards middle and high school math students, but there are several that work for elementary students.

Skype-a-Scientist and Research Projects

One of my favorite additions to the STEM lab over the last couple of years is Skype-a-Scientist. This organization matches K-12 educators with scientists working in a variety of fields. This gives students the opportunity to have a conversation with (as many say) "a real live scientist". They learn about the diversity of careers paths in the sciences and see that science is open to people of all backgrounds. Over the years we have spoken with ecologists, biologists, paleontologists, speleologists, and more. We have met people from the USA, UK, Sweden, Germany, Portugal, and Brazil. 

I incorporate Skype-a-Scientist meetings as part of projects that have students researching and sharing their learning. This year so far all of second (learning about food webs) and third grade (coral reef ecology) have had scientist meetings. By the time spring break gets hear, fifth grade (cartography) will be part of that list as well. Going forward, fourth and first will have their turns.

Building

One activity that has fallen by the wayside during the pandemic is physical building and making. The projects cannot involve materials that are not common household items and for the in person students, they have to be simple enough that students can complete them independently. Then there was the issue of being on a cart and necessity that the materials be easy to move between classes.

Second grade is currently completing a project in which they are building 3D models of animals by combining 2D slotted cardboard pieces. The last day of the project has them mix up their pieces to create fantasy animals that they name and describe for science.

This has certainly been the strangest of school years. I am excited nonetheless about the projects I have planned for the rest of the year. Check back soon to see what we work on next.

Starting the Year in the Virtual STEM Lab

Now that the first 3 weeks of the strangest school year of my career are behind us, and we have settled into a rhythm of sorts, it seemed like a good time for the first blog post of the year.

The lab schedule and projects were created in order to minimize stress on families. Synchronous whole group meetings were set for Monday to introduce the projects and Friday to review and share. The projects varied by grade level of course, but the theme across the board was "plugged or unplugged". I wanted students and families to have a project choice that did not involve a computer because I am well aware of how much time the children are spending in front of the computer already.

The "plugged" option for my Kindergarten, 1st, and 2nd graders had them working in their grade level Code.org courses. It was a bit different this year since the unplugged activities are a bit of a challenge to lead in a Teams meeting. The students who have chosen this activity have done a great job progressing through the lessons. I have been most impressed however with the quality of their responses to the reflection prompts. (These get submitted through our district LMS called the HUB.) It was great to see their excitement about successfully completing the puzzles at each level and to see them reflecting on what they had learned. So far my favorite response to "what is one thing you have learned this week?" is from a 1st grader who noted, "I learned that there is more than one way to do things". That is one of the key messages in the STEM Lab.

The 3rd, 4th, and 5th graders' "plugged" choice involved using the Scratch programming language to create a project. The 4th and 5th graders are familiar with Scratch for the most part and I challenged them to create an animated book review project. The 3rd graders missed out on their traditional introduction to Scratch at the end of second grade, so they are mostly new to the platform (though most have experience with Scratch Jr). Their task was to create a project that introduced themselves to others. In both cases I provided examples, but encouraged the students to be as creative as they wished with the form their projects took. I have not been disappointed so far. The 3rd graders are doing an amazing job of problem solving their way through this new programming environment, and the 4th and 5th graders are extending their skills through some playful experimentation.

The "unplugged" activity was the same for everyone, Kindergarten through 5th grade. The challenge was to use whatever materials they have around to build a 3 dimensional model of a favorite book cover. I showed the students a few examples, but again, they were encouraged to be as creative as possible. The only rule was no 2D products. I have gotten so many amazing projects back so far. This building project has proven to be a bit more of a popular choice than the coding project. I am not terribly surprised by this because when I told the classes in our meetings that they had a non-computer choice there were many looks of relief.

 

As I mentioned above, there is a reflection piece to these choices. The prompts vary by grade level a bit, but are all aimed at getting students to reflect on what they learned, the quality of their work, and to think about how they might improve their projects in a second iteration. One of my favorite prompts is the one that asks students to choose 3 adjectives to describe their work. Some responses I have enjoyed from a variety of students include "challenging", "surprising", "awesome", and "breakable".

We have a few weeks left of fully digital learning. Beyond that point there are many unknowns. But whatever may come, I have loved seeing the students' work, and I know that we will find a way to continue making together.

Getting Unstuck 2020

This has not been the summer that I imagined. I know that holds true for everyone, teachers, students, and parents alike. The ongoing uncertainty regarding the coming school year has been challenging to manage, and has become more so as June has become July, and July slides relentlessly towards August. The current state of affairs has created a paucity of things to get excited about. There are no trips to take, no conferences to go to, no gatherings to attend.

Enter the Scratch Ed Team from the Harvard Graduate School of Education with Getting Unstuck. The Scratch Ed Team works to support teachers with incorporating creative computer programming experiences into their classrooms using the Scratch Programming Language. The Creative Computing Curriculum Guide shares ideas and strategies meant to be adaptable to any computing classroom, afters school club, and other educational spaces. This guide is paired with the Getting Unstuck strategies that offer ways for educators to support their students with problem solving their way through a creative project. Together they help answer the questions, "how can I engage my students in creative computing? and, "what do we do when we get stuck?". These resources are open source, available to all, for free. 

The Getting Unstuck summer learning experience was designed for educators, formal and informal, to connect and support each other through creative Scratch projects. Each week day, from July 6 through July 17 participants received an email containing an open ended programming prompt. There was a link to a studio for people to share their projects in. The studio serves not just a as a warehouse for projects, but as a place for people to draw inspiration, learn how to do things, ask questions, and to gather and offer feedback to each other through the comments feature of Scratch. In addition to the communication tools in Scratch, there was a Twitter hashtag (#GettingUnstuck) to follow and a Facebook group where participants could interact to work out bugs and share tips. Finally, there were two live video meetups for people to gather live to talk about their projects, teaching, learning, and anything else that came up.

I have long felt that the best professional development is teachers talking to other teachers. The Getting Unstuck experience is the best example of this kind of learning. Over the course of this 2 weeks I connected with many dozens of educators from around the world. I saw hundreds upon hundreds of inspiring Scratch projects. I learned new ways to use Scratch, explored elements of the language I am unfamiliar with, and collected inspirations for student projects to last me many years. 

I had the great pleasure to serve as a facilitator for Getting Unstuck. As such, I spent many joyful hours checking out projects in the studios each day helping participants debug their programs, offering tips and encouragement in the comments, and feverishly taking notes in support of my own learning. During the two video meetups I acted as one of the breakout room small group facilitators. Getting Unstuck would certainly have been the highlight of my quarantine professional development schedule on its own. Getting to work alongside Karen and Paulina from HGSE, and Kimberly and Susan, both teachers with a wealth of experience teaching with Scratch, made the experience not just inspiring, but transformative. Heretofore it has been tough to muster much excitement about planning for the new school year given that so much of how it will go remains a colossal question mark. Now, at the conclusion of two weeks of intense making, learning, and connecting, I have finally found the energy and the sense of purpose I need to start crafting my lessons. 

 

Today's live meetup ended with each of the 50+ participants individually unmuting themselves and sharing one word for how they are feeling here at the end of our Getting Unstuck adventure. Inspired, grateful, creative, empowered, and joyful were just some of the words given. I am feeling all of those.

My words cannot fully express how grateful I am to everyone who participated in Getting Unstuck 2020. The energy and inspiration I have received from this community will sustain me through the many challenges that lie ahead. 

My personal Getting Unstuck studio.

Each day's Getting Unstuck studio with everyone's projects linked from this page.

From the Remote STEM Lab

Designing with lenses

This is not how I thought this year would end. I was looking forward to having my 5th graders create animated art works with Scratch and Raspberry Pi. Fourth grade was going to begin working on a Geo-Inquiry to accompany my upcoming Fund For Teachers expedition to the Galapagos Islands. My 3rd graders would be learning about physical computing with Micro:bit, and 2nd grade would be learning to use the full version of Scratch. Kindergarten would be using Scratch Jr. to tell stories. The Digital Making club would have just finished sharing their projects as a part of our annual STEM Night. I would be organizing projects from 3rd, 4th, and 5th grades to present at the Scratch Conference at MIT.

So honored to have been selected as a 2020 @FundforTeachers Fellow! Excited to travel to the Galapagos w/ @kboyceq to create projects based in the @NatGeoEducation Learning Framework for @Sinclair_ES students & to practice the Geo-Inquiry Process in the field! #FFTFellow pic.twitter.com/1vDNDJoGsv

— bradley quentin (@bquentin3) April 2, 2020

Instead, we are all sequestered away from each other. Students are sharing work from home on Scratch, Google Classroom, Living Tree, Teams, and email. My expedition to Ecuador has been pushed back to 2021. The same goes for the Scratch Conference. It is a less than ideal situation.

However, flexibility and adaptability are two of our core values in the STEM Lab, so we adjust our plans and do the best we can in a lousy situation. Here's what we have been doing in the Remote STEM Lab.

Building and Math Art Challenges
I challenged the Kindergarten and first grades to build towers and describe their design choices. Second grade made model animals and then compared and contrasted them. In addition to these, I sent out weekly guides for supplementary projects. These extra projects included building a chain reaction machine, a stabile, and a variety of activities that mash up math and art. (Credit for the math/art projects goes to Annie Perkins.) Those guides can be found here: Remote STEM Guides

@Sinclair_ES 2nd grader Diego created these two model animals, a scorpion and a squid, to compare and contrast for his remote STEM Lab project. #HISD #HISDatHome @HISD_ElemSci pic.twitter.com/wDcjp73RL5

— bradley quentin (@bquentin3) April 30, 2020

@Sinclair_ES first grader and future engineer Drew is building bridges for his remote STEM lab project. Described his process as: build, test, and refine to hold more weight. This design is holding 10 pounds! #HISD #HISDatHome pic.twitter.com/hlEDbVdTlQ

— bradley quentin (@bquentin3) April 23, 2020

Kindergarten students from @Sinclair_ES rocking the remote STEM Lab tower building challenge! #HISDatHome #HISD pic.twitter.com/PaINlOKwka

— bradley quentin (@bquentin3) April 17, 2020

Tons of Triangles

Tessellations

Animal models

Scratch Stories
The 3rd, 4th, and 5th grades were asked to use Scratch to tell a story. I gave them the freedom to decide what kind of story they wanted to tell. I got a wonderful range of projects, from biographies to retellings of fables to original stories. The students shared their projects to studios grouped by grade level. Links to each studio are below.
3rd: scratch.mit.edu/studios/25999827/
4th: scratch.mit.edu/studios/25999840/
5th: scratch.mit.edu/studios/25999872/




Code.org
Kindergarten, first, and second grade worked on completing their Code.org courses. During our office hour meetings we worked on some of the lessons together.

I cannot wait to get back to school to see the amazing students of Sinclair Elementary. I am already planning for next year in the hope that conditions will allow us to gather in person to make, build, and program awesome stuff.

Let the Games Begin!

The cardboard arcade has become a yearly fixture in the STEM lab calendar for 3rd grade. I place this in the third grading cycle because it usually has an extra week and few interruptions to the schedule.

We start with a brief overview of what exactly is an arcade. I always include both definitions (covered passageway lined with shops AND place to play games for a fee), because I see myself as a teacher of all subjects. Then we watch and discuss the Nirvan Mullick film Caine's Arcade which is the original inspiration for the whole cardboard arcade phenomenon. The movie documents the arcade built by a 10 year old boy who was spending the summer hanging around in his father's auto parts store.

Next students get together in teams, or elect to work independently, and brainstorm ideas. I place as few limitations on them as I am able. The games must be table top size and must be playable by first and second graders. I encourage the students be be as creative and not just make a replica of an arcade game they saw at Dave and Buster's. Once an idea is selected, students begin planning in their journals. These plan include a list of materials, steps for completion, and direction for how to play the game. I insist on a detailed plan because I find that it cuts down on the amount of materials that are wasted. During the planning phase I meet with each group to offer feedback on their design. Depending on what they are trying to make, I ask questions to get them thinking about the details that will need to be included. That may be "how will you build the ball return?", "how will you stop the ball from flying across the room?", or "how will player know they have won?".

The construction and testing phase lasts several days. While I do help with some of the tougher cutting tasks, I make the students do as much of the hard work as possible. Last year I banned the use of tape in construction because it is wasteful and fails to hold the game together anyway. I spend a lot of the building class periods teaching students to use white glue and structural elements like L-braces and flanges to attach pieces of cardboard to one another. There is much gnashing of teeth in the beginning when I refuse to produce a roll of tape for them to mummify their project with. However, once a few students get the hang of the glue techniques, they are eager to share their skills with others.

The final phase of the project is always the presentation. I invite a class from a lower grade to come and play the games. I never know who will be available from which grade level, so I prepare the 3rd graders for the fact that they may end up entertaining anyone from Kindergarten through 2nd grade. They are always so excited to show off what they have made and the only disappointment ever voiced is that I did not invite their former teacher or the class with their sibling to participate.

There have been some really great projects so far in this unit including a 3 story escape room game, a pinball machine, and a nicely done soccer/hockey mash-up game.

Digital Dioramas and Skype-a-Scientist

This rotation in the STEM lab has the second grade taking their first steps into combining physical elements with digital ones to create projects. In my almost entirely self-designed curriculum, this kind of fusion is the ultimate goal for the students I work with. 

The students began by selecting an animal to research using the National Geographic Kids page about different species of animals. I let them explore an bit before choosing and starting to take notes in their journals. They also selected partners for this project. I provided the students with a list of facts that they needed to read for and record in their notes, but also encouraged them to include any information that they found especially interesting. Required information included what their animal eats, where it is found, and what threats it faces. We discussed how threats may be natural (predators) or human-caused (habitat loss/ poaching). Finally, they drew a picture of their chosen animal and its habitat in their journals.

Next, the teams worked together to create detailed drawings of their subject animal, its food, and its habitats. They cut out their pictures and practiced animating how they would move around in a Scratch Jr. project. Students used the camera function to photograph the pictures they drew of the habitats as backgrounds. They also added photos of their animal drawings as well as drawings of what it eats and the threats it faces.

Finally, the students programmed their hand-drawn characters to move around and to share facts they gathered through their research. This process was a great opportunity for me to teach the students about a number of different computer science concepts. They are already familiar with the primary event block in the Scratch Jr language, the Green Flag. This event is a general purpose "go" to all of the characters students have added to their programs. However, most of the teams discovered that the Green Flag event has its limitations because it makes everything move at once. When they wanted different characters to move and speak at different times I showed them the messaging events. When they wanted a prey animal to disappear after being eaten, I was able to show them the uses of the "when characters touch" event which is the beginning of understanding conditionals. 

We finished the unit by having each student team share their work on the SMART Board so they could practice providing each other feedback.

Another element of this unit that I personally find super exciting is our video chat with a scientist. This is facilitated by Skype-a-Scientist, a program that matches classrooms with scientists working in a variety of fields. Skype-a-Scientist connects teachers and scientists and they coordinate the scheduling of a video call. This program lets students see and engage with "actual living scientists" who were once sitting in a classroom as they are now. Each class gets to speak to a different scientist with a different area of study, so each conversation is unique. The first group spoke with a conservation biologist in Seattle, and the second group will be speaking with a geologist from the UK. Skype-a-Scientist is a non-profit run by Dr. Sarah McAnulty. I am proud to support this program with a monthly donation, and I would encourage our Sinclair Elementary families, and anyone else who cares about supporting science education to do the same at patreon.com.