During the week of Dec. 4-10 students across USD 475 have been celebrating computer science education week by participating in the worldwide event called “Hour of Code.”
Hour of code is intended to be a one-hour introduction to computer science and coding. To show that anyone can learn the basics. Hour of code takes place every year during Computer Science Education, educators are invited to host an Hour of Code Event. In USD 475 teachers are encouraged to find an opportunity to stop, drop, and code for an hour sometime during the week. During Computer Science Education week teachers have taken advantage of many of the resources provided by their STEM Coaches and Building Instructional Technologists.
Students and staff across the district participate in a variety of ways. Teachers incorporate on-line coding activities, and robotics programming and into their classroom plans for the week. Parents along with school district staff from Teaching and Learning were invited to Jefferson on Monday to participate in an hour of coding with students. This provides an opportunity for students and parents to learn about the many resources available to teach computer science skills and coding basics across all grade levels. Students at Sheridan Elementary participated in a Coding Café all week, each morning the Coding Café was open in the Sheridan library for classes or individual students to come and work on different coding activities. Across the district many teachers already regularly incorporate coding lessons, and robotics lessons, into their lessons. This week allows them an opportunity to continue to expand their students computing skills.
This will be the 3rd year that USD 475 has participated in Hour of Code. The goal for this year is for district students to participate in a total of 7,000 hours of code. Each building has a representative which compiles the number of hours spent in each building to arrive at the district total. The hope is that participation in these activities encourages students and teachers to continue to increase their coding skills and extend their learning about computer science beyond this week. For more information about Hour of Code and Computer Science Education Week visit code.org.
Article provided by Daniel Sell, STEM Coach for USD 475
