OnCUE program skills to build routines in Cargo Bot. Meanwhile, Lego Mindstorms, code.org, codehs, and more allow middle schoolers and above to begin stretching their programming knowledge

Educate. Innovate. Explore.OnCUE

Spring 2014 | Vol. 36 | No. 1

KIDS & CODINGCoding Defined + Resources

Kids Find Value in Obtaining Programming Skills

Teaching Something That Actually Matters

Mobile Tools Bring Coding Opportunities to Learners of all Ages

Tech and Teaching

CONTENTS

CONTENTS

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OnCUE journal (ISSN 0739-9553) is published and bulk-mailed four times during the academic year by CUE, and is one of the benefits of membership. Membership for CUE is $40/year, U.S. regular rate, $30/year, U.S. student rate, and $20/year retired rate. Corporate memberships are available.

Entire contents Copyright 2014 by CUE unless otherwise indicated. All rights reserved. To reprint articles that are copyrighted by the author, you must contact the author for permission. All other items may be reprinted for educational use, but not for sale, with the provision that proper credit is given to OnCUE and to the author, if any.

Editor Sara Armstrong, [email protected]

Design Kesler Communicationskeslercommunications.com

Contributing Writers Barbara Bray, John Cradler, Robert EM Craven, Tim Landeck, Melody McGill, David Thornburg

CUE promotes and supports the effective use of technology in the educational community.

2013-2014 CUE Board of DirectorsRobert EM Craven, President [email protected]

Ray Chavez, Vice President/Treasurer [email protected]

Lainie Rowell, Secretary [email protected]

Kyle Brumbaugh, Member at Large [email protected]

David Malone, Member [email protected]

Diana Paradise, Member [email protected]

Suzanne Mitchell, Member at Large [email protected]

Andrew Schwab, Member [email protected]

Roger Wagner, Member [email protected]

Mike Lawrence, Executive Director [email protected], 877 Ygnacio Valley Road, Suite 200, Walnut Creek, CA 94596Phone 925.478.3460 | Fax 925.934.6799 | [email protected]

Bits and Bytes

Vote! CUE Board of Directors Candidates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .16

CUE SF: Newest CUE Affiliate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .16

Administrator’s Corner: Creativity, Problem Solving, Career-Readiness: Administrators’ Perspectives Toward Coding In K12 SchoolsJason Borgen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .17

Legislative Advocacy: Local Control and the Future of Educational Technology in CaliforniaJohn Cradler . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .18

Features

Coding Defined + ResourcesBonnie Bracey Sutton. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .6

Kids Find Value in Obtaining Programming Skills Shauna Hawes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .7

Teaching Something That Actually MattersSteven Abell . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .8

Mobile Tools Bring Coding Opportunities to Learners of all AgesLucie deLaBruere . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .10

Tech and TeachingLeVar Burton . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .12

Departments

Professional Development: Kids, Coding, PD – Oh My!Barbara Bray . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .13

Technology Coordinator: Guide On The Side, or How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love Accept Knowing Less Than My StudentsCraig Miller . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .22

The CUE Review: Make the Turtle Do What??!! And Other Creative PossibilitiesMelody McGill . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .30

Columns

Upfront: Programming for Success for Our Students— Today and TomorrowRobert EM Craven . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .4

The Bleeding Edge: Computer Programming for ChildrenDavid D. Thornburg, PhD . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .5

On IT with CETPA: A Roundtable Discussion About CCSS: What’s Involved and How Do We Get There? Part ILisa Kopochinski . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .27

CUE Information & Forms:

Infinite Thinking Machine . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .14California Student Media Festival . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .14CUE Professional Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .15Innovative Educator Advanced Studies Certificate . . . . . . . . . . . . .15CUE West Coast Summit featuring Google for Education . . . . . .19CUE Membership Application . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .25Calendar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .26Leadership 3.0 Symposium . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .29Annual CUE Conference . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .32

4 | Spring 2014 OnCUE • cue.org

UpFront Robert EM Craven , CUE Board President

Programming for Success for Our Students—Today and Tomorrow

From sports stars to music icons, the President of the United States to billionaires, everyone is pitching our students to learn computer programming. Clearly, programming and computer science are now essential for today’s students. Given this new “celebrity” status for programming, there’s a growing chorus encouraging educators to begin integrating computer science into our classes. Fortunately, it’s never been easier.

The explosion in the last few years of hardware and software to feed children’s curiosity is unbelievable. Raspberry-Pi, Makey-Makey, Lego Mindstorms, Sphero, and NAO each offer budding programmers easy hardware opportunities to program and interact with the world. On the software side, preschoolers laugh while making Daisy the Dinosaur flip, rotate, and enlarge, while older students are challenged to learn basic program skills to build routines in Cargo Bot. Meanwhile, Lego Mindstorms, code.org, codehs, and more allow middle schoolers and above to begin stretching their programming knowledge.

Unfortunately, save a nationally promoted week here or random high school elective there, computer programming is underrepresented in our schools. Given the low cost hardware and software currently available on the market, as educators we are afforded a wonderful opportunity to integrate programming into our courses. During the last few centuries, reading and writing were essential to a successful life, becoming cornerstones of school curriculum. We all know that today’s generation of students needs a myriad of skills to be successful, far beyond reading and writing; but just as those form the basics to a quality education, so too should programming. The analytical and mathematical skills, and understanding of not only how things work and how to control those items in this increasingly interconnected world, are all essential elements today’s students can learn through programming. Integrating these concepts into the modern curriculum is a tremendous but beneficial challenge for educators.

We all know that today’s generation of students needs a myriad of skills to be successful, far beyond reading and writing; but just as those form the basics to a quality education, so too should programming.

My 10-year-old son, Miguel Angel (pictured above), who enjoys programming, “because it’s like controlling small worlds,” likens the process of programming to shopping in a mall. “When you step in the door, it’s your start point, the hallways are the routes or units to get to the stores, and the stores are filled with information you need. You must learn to navigate to that information, combine it with other knowledge, and then get to the final store that is the endpoint.” He and many students enjoy the “mission” aspect in programming that is “fun, and at the same time you are thinking, changing things, and learning.”

The wonder in each of these products is multifaceted. Be it using bananas to control Mario with a Makey-Makey, building a Lego robot to pick up red balls, or designing a Minecraft world, today’s students, teachers, and parents are able to insert laughter, joy, and learning into life. The added bonus is that underneath all the laughter and smiles, learning is taking root. CUE

Robert EM Craven is an educator with a technology obsession. An educator for over 15 years, Robert quickly realized the impact technology made on his teaching and student learning; this discovery started him on his endless journey into the integration, development, and practice of technology and curriculum. Robert is the Director

for Technology and Media Services in the Fullerton School District, an Apple Distinguished Educator, Google Certified Teacher, and was recognized as one of the five “Best of ISTE” presenters in 2007, 2009, and 2010. Robert currently serves as President of the CUE Board of Directors. [email protected]

cue.org • Spring 2014 OnCUE | 5

When personal computers came on the market in the late 1970’s, they all had one similar characteristic—they entered a marketplace devoid of applications. Instead, it was thought that users would craft programs of their own. To facilitate this, the first computers on the market (Commodore PET, TRS-80 Model 1, and Apple II) came with a simple programming language, BASIC (Beginners All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code), built in. This language was developed at Dartmouth to allow non-scientists to easily write their own programs. A then-small company (Microsoft) took the ideas behind this language and adapted it to personal computers with the result that dialects of BASIC were built into the firmware of most personal computers.

When personal computers came into schools, the assumption was that students would write their own programs. Even after some rudimentary word processors and graphics programs were created, programming was still pretty high on the list of things kids would do once they had access to computers.

Right Idea, Wrong LanguageWhile BASIC was free, it had an inelegance that led to the creation of programs that were hard to read, and hard to debug. All variables, for example, were global. This means that if the letter S was set to some value early on in the program, this value would often be used a few pages away when the author may have forgotten the value originally set to the variable (variable names tended to be single letters in those days). Other confusing aspects of BASIC included the strange use of the equal sign. For example, the statement,

K=K+2

is an instruction to change the current value of K to the old value plus two. Algebraically, this is an incorrect use of the equal sign, but there it was to bring confusion to all! Much more could be said about the early forms of BASIC, but suffice it to say that, while free, it was not the optimal programming language for children.

The Rise of LogoLong before the advent of personal computers, MIT professor Seymour Papert felt that children could learn amazing things by working with the correct programming language. So, in collaboration with some colleagues, the Logo programming language was born in 1967 by Danny Bobrow, Wally Feurzig, Seymour Papert, and Cynthia Solomon. The work was done at Bolt, Beranek, and Newman, a major consulting firm in the Boston area, and the decision was made to create Logo along similar lines to the professional programming language, LISP.

Computer Programming for ChildrenThe Bleeding Edge David D. Thornburg, PhD

While much easier to learn than LISP, Logo supported the use of good programming practices to the point where adept Logo programmers could easily transition into LISP if they wanted.

Early versions of Logo controlled a floor robot (called a turtle) that could be used to draw pictures. Papert’s idea was that, by thinking about what kids would do if they were to trace out a path themselves, they could write programs to create this shape on the computer.

For example, if you wanted to create a square path for the turtle to follow, you could write:

repeat 4 [ fd 10 rt 90 ]

Where fd means “forward” and rt means “turn right.” In this example, 10 is the numbers of “steps” the turtle takes, and 90 is the amount the turtle turns, in degrees. Once computers with graphical display screens became available, versions of Logo were created that allowed the turtle to exist virtually on the display screen and draw lines to indicate its path. While Logo could do far more than draw pictures, most school applications of Logo focused on the creation of pictures on the screen. Papert maintained that when the picture didn’t reflect the intention of the student, powerful learning could take place through the process of “debugging” the program to make it work properly. Unlike BASIC, variables in Logo were generally local, meaning they only had meaning within a procedure. For example, the procedure shown below draws a five-pointed star on the screen with the side length of :size. (Note, Logo distinguishes between the name of a variable and its value, thus avoiding confusion.)

to star :sizerepeat 5 [ fd :size rt 144 ]

end

To draw a star with a side length of 50, you would then type

star 50

In fact, every procedure in Logo “extends” the language to incorporate this new command.

Continued on page 26


You may know coding as programming. Coding is the act of writing a program in a programming language. So when people say you will need to know coding, they are saying you need to know two things. You need to know the language and you need to know how to use the language. It is easier to show an example of coding than to explain it (see code.org/learn).

You’ve seen the craze for learning code. But what exactly is coding? Coding is what makes it possible for us to create computer software, apps, and websites. Your browser, your OS, the apps on your phone, Facebook, and the Code website—they’re all made with code.

Here’s a simple example of code, written in the Python programming language:

print ‘Hello, world!’

Many code tutorials use that command as their very first example, because it’s one of the simplest examples of code you can have—it ‘prints’ (displays) the text ‘Hello, world!’ on the screen. See a code.org’s video that explains coding: “What Most Schools Don’t Teach” (cue.tc/MostSchools).

CS4HSThe Computer Science Teachers Association (CSTA) is a membership organization that supports and promotes the teaching of computer science and other computing disciplines (see www.csta.acm.org). CSTA provides opportunities for K–12 teachers and students to better understand the computing disciplines and to more successfully prepare themselves to teach and learn. There is outreach to teachers in this program for professional development, including promoting CS4HS.

CS4HS (Computer Science for High School) is an initiative sponsored by Google to promote computer science and computational thinking in high school and middle school curricula. With a gift from Google’s Education Group, universities develop two- or three-day workshops for local high school and middle school computer science teachers. These workshops incorporate informational talks by industry leaders, and discussions on new and emerging computer science curricula at the high school and middle school levels, including coding. On the CSTA site, you’ll find information on how to apply for a CS4HS grant, information for workshop attendees and partners, and other helpful resources. CS4HS funding is currently offered in the US, Canada, Europe, Middle East, Africa, China, New Zealand, and Australia. You

could also learn a lot by attending a CSTA Conference, which features workshops, mentors, and classroom applications.

Coding for Kids Many offerings can be found online that promote and teach coding to students from very young years through high school.

For example, Code.org offers tutorials. CodeHS (codehs.com) provides experiences and an online curriculum designed specifically for high school classrooms.

Codeacademy After School (www.codeacademy.com/afterschool) presents a complete online afterschool program for a coding club.

Tynker (www.tynker.com) offers a programming course for 4th to 8th graders.

Scratch (scratch.mit.edu), produced by the Lifelong Kindergarten Group at MIT, challenges children and adults access to “learn to code; code to learn.”

Coding increases creativity and critical thinking as students develop their ideas and translate them to the screen or tablet. Communication skills grow as students think through their ideas with their peers and share their work with the online world. Let’s harness this opportunity to help students become producers, not just consumers, in our technological world. CUE

Bonnie Bracey Sutton is a teacher agent of change who has taught in many different types of schools and who has traveled to many countries in the name of technology. She worked with President Clinton and Vice President Gore on the initiation of the use of the Internet in schools 20 years ago and she is still trying to help schools broaden engagement for women

and minorities in technology. Her interests are social justice, digital equity, computational thinking, STEM, and digital citizenship. She currently is working with Yvonne Andres in a US/Russia Social Expertise Exchange (SEE) Initiative, and has traveled to Russia to explore and share best practices. She is a member of the Autodesk Educational Advisory Board and is the educational director of Wired Safety.Org. [email protected]

Feature Bonnie Bracey Sutton

Coding Defined + ResourcesCoding ˈkōdiNG/ noun

the process of assigning a code to something for the purposes of classification or identification.


Feature Shauna Hawes

“I need a couple of volunteers.”

These words came from D., a student with autism, whose previous interactions with other general education students had been filled with suspicion and accusations. This time, he had created an interactive game using Scratch. He had labored for days to make his helicopter blades move, he had beta-tested this with friends, and he had very diligently worked through every detail that he had hosted in his mind. When the volunteers came forward, D. patiently taught them the key strokes that would command their helicopters, and then stepped back and beamed as they played HIS game, and then as other students asked and begged to have a turn.

As educators, we have correlated the connection between students reading well and writing well. Our students have become comfortable users of technology, and the next step is having the students use technology to support and even to demonstrate their learning.

In a recent training on math and C++ programming at UC Davis, Dr. Harry Cheng pointed out that traditional algebra practice presents problems to be solved and encourages students to find answers. However, having the students create programs to solve the challenges allowed them to identify the variables and the steps involved in solving the problem. This is the goal of Common Core—to have students be able not only to solve the problem but also to understand the logic and sequence of the process. As I grew up viewing math as irrelevant to anything I would ever do, I can sympathize with those students who feel lost and disconnected from math. However, when designing a program that made the computer DO the calculations for me in a recent training, I realized that I would have not even realized how much math I was doing and I would have loved the challenge of it all.

In a programming environment such as Scratch, students have to follow the logic and sequence challenges as well. They have to have a sense of order, but also get to be creative and unique in their own ways. Scratch has a library full of student samples where students can take ideas and mix them with their own projects to create unique outcomes.

I surveyed my 7th and 8th graders with these questions: Should we teach programming in school? Why or why not? Repeatedly, they referenced potential careers, a topic I have never discussed with them. My favorite comment came from one of my students who wrote: “I think we should teach programming in school because we might use it later in life and we [will] have experience. I also think it would come in handy to have those kind of skills. It kind of came in handy for me because the other day I was using Scratch at home. My mom has been trying to teach my little sister to memorize her alphabet and numbers, so I decided to create something in Scratch that will help her.I created a skit that she can learn from and she has memorized most ofher alphabets as well as her numbers. I think programming is somethingthat should be taught because it can be very useful.”

My middle school technology students have already worked with Scratch, and will soon begin working in the student-friendly C++ environment designed by Dr. Cheng and his team at Davis. We look forward to the challenges that programming will bring, and can’t wait to share our successes. CUE

A teacher for over 15 years, Shauna Hawes has a passion for using technology to support student achievement. Currently she teaches technology classes full-time to sixth, seventh, and eighth graders. In 2007, she was named East Bay CUE Teacher of the Year, and Teacher of the Year for Alameda

and Contra Costa Counties, plus Mt. Diablo Unified School District’s Teacher of the Year. Since 2008, she’s worked with the Oracle Education Foundation to teach teachers about 21st Century Learning, including project-based learning, in northern and southern California, other states, and in Romania. She is the lead in her district’s piloting of Google Apps for Education, and her latest project at Valley View Middle School has been to implement Mouse Squad—a student tech leadership program. [email protected]

Kids Find Value in Obtaining Programming Skills

... that you should teach programming

in schools. It would help people do things

on computers like make games, fix things you think are

wrong, and make websites to get together more. –Kevin

... that students should learn programming in school because it’s a whole new way of learning things. People can use programming for life after school, programming is also used in lots of careers like Business and Tech. –Olivia

... that we should be taught programs. I think that it will better our wisdom in technology and give us opportunities to learn new things. –Lauren

... we should [teach programming] because when you become a robot maker you could program it and stuff. Also you could program a medical computer to help people. –Hien

... we should because it is essential for our jobs in the future; well, at least the one I want to get –Julian

I THINK ...


I remember, back in the ‘90s, reading an article in the San Jose Mercury News about CD-ROMs. In this article, some educators expressed a need for grant funding to learn how to make these things, so they could teach their students. One teacher said that if they didn’t get the funding for this training, their students would soon be teaching them how to do it.

It is embarrassing to count the kinds of wrong in this, and yet these people said these things right out in public. I wish this kind of experience were rare. It is not. I read about such things all the time. As a software developer who has built several successful development teams, I just shake my head.

One of the liabilities of the computing business is its eternally high Gee Whiz quotient. Teachers see the latest expression of Gee Whiz, think it is significant, and believe they must teach that so their students will be up to date.

Unless you are determined to waste everyone’s time, that’s not how it works.

How can you identify something about computing that is worth teaching? Let me pose an analogy:

Consider the Human Being. Even our best specimens are not very strong. We cannot fly, or even run very fast. Our sense of smell is abysmal, and our hearing is not all that great. Our visual acuity is mediocre. We have no claws or teeth that any other creature needs to fear, neither do we possess chemical or electrical repellents. We have no spines or thick skin to protect us, or camouflage to hide our inadequacies. How do we even manage to stay alive? There are three reasons.

First, while our vision is unexceptional in terms of pixel density, we have fairly good depth perception.

Second, while we are not as adept at manipulation as some other creatures, our hands are at least better than average at this.

Third, and most importantly, we are the creature that mutates in software. What does that mean? Think about the other animals that share our planet. Ask yourself how they live, and the answer appears in two levels: how they use their physical attributes to adopt a particular mode of living. As we have just discussed, our physical attributes are unremarkable. But we have the ability to adopt a large number of widely divergent modes of living. When other creatures’ environmental niches disappear, they usually become extinct, unless Mr. Darwin manages to find them a way out. When our current

niche disappears, we learn another one and go on, and often several times in the same lifetime. We hunt, gather, farm, fish, dig, build, on and on, nearly ad infinitum. More than any other animal, we can learn to live in many different ways, in many different environments. As long as we are free to think, we are the Anything Animal.

Now consider the computer. It does only a dozen or so things, and none of these things counts for much on its own. Look at it up close, and a computer is close to useless. The only reason anyone builds computers is because the nearly useless things computers do can be composed together in flexible sequences, which the computer can then carry out so bloody awful fast. Because of this, it replaces any number of special-purpose devices that are actually more efficient. More than any other machine, it can learn to live in many different ways, in many different environments. It is the Anything Machine.

As you think about teaching computing to your students, if you ever stray very far from this understanding of what a computer is and why we build them, you are missing the point, and missing it badly.

As a consumer of your wares, I am telling you not to teach any particular “technology” or application program. I especially do not want you to teach any particular brand of product. This means you should not be teaching Word or Excel or PowerPoint, even more especially if what you are teaching has a year or release number attached to it. If you do this, you are by definition creating your students as products that will already be obsolete by the time they hit the market. You must teach your students what kinds of things these programs do. Help them to understand why such things are useful, valuable, and important. You might also help your students learn to read and write manuals, and how to spot software that is badly designed. If you feel obligated to teach Word or Excel or PowerPoint, you will be wise to show different versions, or, better yet, show competing programs by other vendors, so students can see how the same software ideas can be presented

Teaching Something That Actually Matters

Feature Steven T. Abell


in different ways, and understand that the latest version might not necessarily be an improvement.

I would rather see you teach your students how to think, and incidentally how to think in terms of computing. Here is a list to start with:

Isomorphism: a relationship between sets that are essentially the same.

Modeling things in the world in terms of numbers, and understanding the difference between continuous (analog) and discrete (digital) models.

Data structures: arrays, stacks, queues, trees, lattices, linked lists, etc., their time properties and their projection onto one-dimensional space.

Understand that computers don’t actually do arithmetic. They do something that is somewhat like arithmetic. You need to know what they actually do, so you can use it effectively and safely as arithmetic.

Programming: a style of thinking that is sequential, precise, and reflective. Or, as computer scientist Adele Goldberg says, knowing who knows what when.

Translations between different language forms (for example: prefix, infix, and postfix), and why and when one might prefer one form over another.

Function, object, and inference: higher-order models of software thought.

Von Neumann Machine: the dominant conceptual model of computer architecture.

Yes, you can teach these things to children, even young children. Every person conquers all of these ideas or their close relatives at a very young age. Then they bury them under layers and layers of subconscious optimization and shortcuts. Learning software-think is a deliberate act of lowering one’s consciousness, so these ideas can once again become visible for what they are. If they all seem to have large or arcane words attached to them, perhaps it is because, by the time anyone realized these simple ideas even needed to be thought about, all the simple words were already taken.

What tools should you use? Aside from a whiteboard, here are some good choices: Forth, Smalltalk, Lisp, Prolog, APL. Start with Forth, preferably one of the older implementations where it is easy to crash the machine. Some people call these dead languages, but they are and remain the big guns of computing. They are the big guns because

they are so incredibly simple. They offer execution models that are easy to understand, and environments in which experimentation is not only possible, but the way things are normally done. And they do these things in ways that mask the more onerous properties of the Von Neumann Machine. While most programming languages contain at least a few regrettable design choices, there is no adequate reason to use watered-down kiddie languages. Do not teach any but your engineering-bound students anything like Java or C# or C++, and try not to do it even then. When the time is right, and if you have done your job well, they will learn these on their own faster than you can teach them. Never teach anyone anything called BASIC.

The challenge for educators is to create right-sized projects that require the use of the fundamental ideas outlined here. Here are some examples for your students to create:

Household thermostat

Automaton that navigates around obstacles to a goal

Address book

Word processor

Spreadsheet

Instant messenger

Evolutionary optimizer

Yes, you read that right. Your elementary students can do these things, and many more, if only you have adequate respect for their intellect and the courage to teach them. By the time they get to high school, they will be teaching you how to do things you never imagined. That’s the way it should be. CUE

Steven T. Abell is a Software Designer in and around Silicon Valley. Starting with a degree in mathematics, he has been in the software business for nearly 35 years, working across a broad spectrum of programming languages and product types. Steve is often accused of having the only meaningful software engineering interview that most people have ever

seen. He designs and implements products from the mundane to the exotic. He also cleans up other people’s messes, and builds and manages high-functioning software development teams. Steve doesn’t do websites. [email protected]

As you think about teaching computing to your students, if you ever stray very far from [the] understanding of what a computer is and why we build them, you are missing the point, and missing it badly.

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According to Professor J. Paul Gibson, PhD, in a Wired article, “You can start teaching computer science before students even know

how to read and write.”

When the media puts the spotlight on some very young app developers like 12-year-old Thomas Suarez and 9-year-old Alexandra Jordan, it is easy to be impressed but also easy to dismiss these children as outliers. But, when 50,000,000 students write 500,000,000 lines of code in seven days as part of the Hour of Code event last November, it is hard to ignore the fact that “Kids can code,” and they can learn to code at a very young age.

Last year, Estonia made headlines as the first country to teach kids how to code starting at the age of seven. Their goal is not to “start churning out app developers of the future, but people who have smarter relationships with technology, computers, and the web.” Estonia wants to “change thinking that computers and programs are just things as they are.”

But how young is too young? According to Professor J. Paul Gibson, PhD, in a Wired article, “You can start teaching computer science before students even know how to read and write.” Gibson’s research led him to develop several games and puzzles that successfully teach kids aged 5 to 11 popular programming algorithms.

As more mobile tablets are finding their way into the hands of our younger learners, it is exciting to see the appearance of apps such as Bee-Bot whose developers also believe that KIDS CAN CODE (cue.tc/BeeBot). As supplier for the popular Bee-Bot and supporting instructional materials for early elementary, TSS Group was one of the first to offer an age-appropriate mobile app for teaching early learners the coding skill of sequencing. No reading skills are necessary for students to create a sequence of instructions that move the digital bee through a maze similar to the mats that accompany the Bee-Bot robots.

Another option for learning to code using a mobile device with little to no reading required is the Light-bot app developed by Danny Yaroslavski (danny-yaroslavski.com/)—who learned programming when he, himself, was 12 years old. Danny even released a special cross-platform version of the Light-bot app (light-bot.com) especially designed to help students complete their Hour of Code. But don’t be deceived by the simple tasks of helping a robot turn on a switch. The app quickly progresses to levels that help players gain understanding of programming concepts such as procedures, loops, and conditionals.

Probably the most complete approach to helping young learners code on a mobile device came in the form of a family of cute, fuzzy characters that are part of the Kodable app (www.surfscore.com). Not only does

Kodable speak to kids with its gamification features (characters, high scores, badges), it addresses the needs of teachers and parents. The site offers learning guides and opportunities for teachers to set up classrooms where students can support teachers and parents who have NO previous programming experience. As they learn to code, the adults become partners with their children in the endeavor. The Kodable app levels quickly advance to include some rather complex coding concepts such as logic, sequence, conditions, loops, functions, and debugging.

Once students become early readers, they are primed to start using apps like Hopscotch (www.gethopscotch.com) that provide students with a more open-ended creation environment using colored blocks of code that fit together like Legos. Fans of Mitch Resnick will recognize these apps as providing a similar pedagogically sound creative environment to Scratch (scratch.mit.edu). Students start by writing short scripts that are set off by triggers such as “when I tilt the iPad” or “when I touch the iPad” to create animations and games while they also learn about angles and the coordinate grid.

Feature Lucie deLaBruere

Mobile Tools Bring Coding Opportunities to

Learners of all Ages

Dave Bouchard, enrichment teacher at Jericho Elementary School, leads an entire class of second grade students through a session of Light-bot during the Hour of Code week.

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Resources such as Wes Fryer’s free e-book, “Hopscotch Challenges ~ Learn to Code With an iPad” (cue.tc/iPadHopscotch), offer educators who are new to coding valuable tips on how to use Hopscotch to provide problem-solving challenges to students. The new Share feature was the needed piece to take learning with Hopscotch to a level that allows students to build a community of users where they can mix and remix each other’s code. This lets students experience the creativity cycle made popular by the M.I.T. Kindergarten group (see article referenced below for more information).

When students start to outgrow Hopscotch, it is the perfect time to introduce them to more sophisticated coding options available with the AppCraft app from the iTunes store. AppCraft provides students with a drawing toolkit for creating their own sprites (actors), a very comprehensive collection of blocks to code with, and a physics engine. Middle school students can start to create some rather complex apps and game prototypes with AppCraft. One sixth grader almost made me sign a nondisclosure before I could look at a multi-level game he had created “on his own time” after a half-hour introduction to AppCraft.

Although the open-ended environment provided by AppCraft is a powerful environment for students to create their own projects, it lacks the supplementary resources needed to guide middle school students towards learning best practices of coding. For that task, I would make sure the Cargo-Bot app (cue.tc/CargoBotApp) is installed on student devices. Cargo-Bot received attention for having been totally created on an iPad, but it deserves its praises for its potential to teach fairly advanced coding techniques to kids in a game-like way using tools that many programmers would find in their coding frameworks. It has a fun debug feature that allows students to walk through their code solution step by step, as well as a record feature, which allows students to make movies of their coding solutions to proudly share with friends or in an e-portfolio.

I would recommend installing Cargo-Bot AND AppCraft on EVERY middle school student’s mobile tablet, and giving them an Hour of Code every week to anyone who would like to see amazing outcomes that testify that KIDS CAN CODE!

Although a larger selection of programs to teach coding is available on laptops and desktops, one of the advantages of using mobile tools to build coding skills is that many students have anywhere anytime access to these mobile devices and can continue to play with code outside the classroom, while riding the bus, waiting for a event to start, or at home. This advantage moves the opportunity to code from an HOUR of Code to HOURS of code. A mobile device equipped with the right apps can give students increased opportunities to start building the 10,000 hours that kids like Bill Gates and Steve Job logged in their journeys to grow and sharpen their thinking skills. CUE

Lucie deLaBruere has 30 years of experience in K-12 schools and currently teaches at the University of Vermont, Marlboro College, and St. Michael’s College. She works as a digital age learning specialist who is passionate about creativity and innovation in schools, digital equity, and emerging technology. [email protected]

References:

Koerner, Brendan I. “Forget Foreign Languages and Music. Teach Our Kids to Code,” Wired, cue.tc/WiredKidsCode

Olson, Parmy. “Why Estonia Has Started Teaching Its First-Graders to Code,” Forbes, cue.tc/Estonia1stGraders

Resnick, Mitch. “All I Really Needed to Know (About Creative Thinking) I Learned (By Studying How Children Learn) in Kindergarten.” PDF available from cue.tc/ResnickKindergarten

LEFT: Jericho Elementary School (VT) students join Hour of Code week using Kodable.

Above: Middle school students mentor younger learners build-ing their coding skills at St. Albans City School (VT).

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Just take a look at the world our children are growing up in compared to the one we grew up in. Technology has transformed day-to-day life in ways unfathomable just ten years ago. It has become impossible for our kids to thrive in society without basic and even extensive use of technology in every aspect of their lives. “Schools” and the “classroom” are also in a metamorphosis. I put those words in quotes as our very definition of them is changing because of technology.

Bringing in Smart Boards, tablets, and who knows what comes next in the classroom can make the transferring of knowledge to the future generation more efficient and effective.

It’s teachers, however, who remain the inspirational and motivational leaders of the class. Slavery or Hitler or particle physics can be taught from a printed book, via a streaming movie, through old fashioned flash cards, or on iPad Airs with about the same level of detail being communicated to the audience. What machines cannot do is excite a young person to wonder WHY Hitler was allowed to gain power in the first place, and why no one spoke up. An iPad will never ask a young girl to give thought to the human face of slavery beneath the economic reasoning for its emergence in America, the land of the free.

Only one letter differentiates Teach and Tech. The challenge for us as parents and educators is to ensure that tech itself is never the end—but rather the means—for expanding human knowledge and a passion for learning in our children. One of the reasons I so firmly believed in Gene Roddenberry’s vision of the future was that on Star Trek, the technology never got in the way of the humanity. In fact, Lt. Commander Data was a product of technology, a machine himself, who yearned to be human. Geordi’s visor gave him sight, but it was his spirit, dedication to hard work, and friendships that made him part of the crew of the Enterprise, not his ability to see.

So as we develop and exploit technology at home and in the classroom, as we evolve from one-way communication (a book or a video) to interactivity at all levels, it’s my hope that those of us who create technology remember the human component so necessary for learning...teachers. Teachers are the original and the best interactive learning tools we have ever had. CUE

LeVar Burton’s career spans many roles: actor (e.g., as Kunta Kinte in Roots; Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge in Star Trek: The Next Generation), host and executive producer of PBS’ Reading Rainbow, television and film director (several Star Trek episodes, and feature films including The Tiger Woods Story, Smart House, Blizzard, and Reach for Me). His latest project combines technology and education in RRKidz (see www.readingrainbow.com). LeVar was a guest of President Obama and the co-host of the White House Science Fair in 2013. He is a recipient of the 2013 Common Sense Media Award for his lifetime of work on behalf of children. LeVar includes “educator” and “student” among his roles as well. [email protected]

Feature LeVar Burton

Tech and Teaching

The challenge for us as parents and educators is to ensure that tech itself is never the end—but rather the means—for expanding human knowledge and a passion for learning in our children.

keynote speaker


Kids, Coding, PD – Oh My!Professional Development Barbara Bray

Kids love to code, yet teachers need some nudging to incorporate coding in their classes because they have so much on their plate. I put out a call to my PLN to find out what teachers are doing with kids, coding, and encouraging teachers to incorporate coding with their curriculum. One teacher who stood out showed how you can expand coding to multiple classrooms.

“We got to get kids programming.”

Rae Fearing, Educational Technology Coordinator and STEM Coordinator for Del Norte County Unified School District in Crescent City, California, shared with me a five-week Code In project with 5th grade teacher Bill Filsinger, in which his kids were introduced to computer programming using the free app Hopscotch. Rae worked one-on-one coaching with Bill and his kids during the project last year. The purpose for this project was two-fold:

Since it is important to increase STEM related learning activities for learners, exploring skills and concepts related to computer programming and technology helps prepare learners to be successful in college and career, and exposes them to a field with growing job opportunities.

iPads are new to Del Norte County USD and are primarily used for skills practice and content consumption. These are excellent uses of the iPad, but they can provide so much more. Moving to content creation, information sharing, and idea development will help learners with the Four C’s (critical thinking, collaboration, creativity, and communication) that are essential skills in today’s world.

Looking for a way to provide relevance, the 5th graders were asked to create simple programs and educational games they could use with their 1st grade buddies. One student created a game to help younger learners learn their shapes, another did a game on times tables, and many more similar games were created in only two hours after learning the app. Kids were teaching each other and the teacher. Rae shared several sites about these projects:

My 5th Grade Code In Project: cue.tc/EdTechyness15th Graders Build Games with Hopscotch: cue.tc/EdTechyness2Winners of the 5th Grade Code In Project: cue.tc/EdTechyness3Making Time for Coding with Kids: cue.tc/EdTechyness4

This year Rae’s coding program expanded.

“Coaching teachers so kids can code.”

She is still working with Bill from last year and has added another teacher at another school to do a four-week project in both classrooms (3rd grade and 5th grade). To expand the project, Rae participated in the Hour of Code during computer science education week. She held teacher

“Anyone can AND SHOULD know how to code. It is the universal language of our digital future.” – Rae Fearing

1

2

preview sessions to de-mystify coding and show teachers how they and their learners could learn computer programming. Eleven teachers came to the preview sessions. Five teachers had Rae go to their classes, and already two have asked her to do longer projects with their classes.

Kids from last year’s Code In project recognized Rae and asked her, “There she is! Are we going to code again?”

Rae wrote, “I am seeing teachers try new things and take risks in their classrooms. A 3rd grade teacher with one iPad led a whole class activity using the Light-bot app, and then I was able to come in a week later and bring a class set of iPads, so each learner could code on their own. Next, I will be coming to that classroom once a week to take the learners through a month-long coding project.”

Teachers’ comments inspired Rae to expand the program:“OMG! I wish I had a video camera right now! I had to e-mail you during class, because we are coding. I have the Apple TV on with the task, and the kids are coding on their white boards. They love it, I love it, we all love it!!”

“We got a little early start, because I wanted to familiarize them with it before next week, and now they can’t stop! :)”

“The thinking and discussion that is taking place is amazing! I’ve got kids standing up, turning their bodies, jumping, etc., and then those who can just do it sitting at their desks and looking at it. Wish you were here to see it!”

I want to thank Rae for sharing her story on why coding really motivates learners and how teachers are able to deepen learning in their classrooms when kids know how to code. On her blog about the Hour of Code, Rae wrote, “This year I am encouraging teachers in my school district to code with every student. I believe programming and computer science courses should be a requirement, not an elective. Anyone can AND SHOULD know how to code. It is the universal language of our digital future.” CUE

Rae Fearing is a Google Certified Teacher and Leading Edge Certified Online and Blended Educator and Professional Developer. Previously she taught biology and marine science courses at Del Norte High School for 12 years. She holds a Masters in Science Education from Oregon State University. Prior to her career in education Rae worked for ten

years in the zoo and aquarium field as a zookeeper, sea lion trainer, and bird of prey handler. [email protected]

Barbara Bray, Creative Learning Strategist, writes a regular column on professional development for OnCUE, is Owner/Founder of My eCoach (my-ecoach.com) and Co-Founder of Personalize Learning (www.personalizelearning.com). Follow Barbara on Twitter: @bbray27 [email protected]


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Bits & Bytes


CUE welcomed its newest affiliate in San Francisco, California. CUE SF serves educators within San Francisco County and nearby cities under the leadership of its co-presidents, Karen McGarrah and Susan Kameny. CUE SF provides services and support for the San Francisco region, which have been absent for the last decade. Both McGarrah and Kameny serve the San Francisco district as Computer Technology Integration Specialists and have been friends since they met at a local district meeting in 2007. McGarrah and Kameny both felt that educators throughout the region shared a common feeling of being in the midst of an educational earthquake. Teachers they encountered felt that everything had been shaken up. There was a sense that everything needed to be rebuilt. Unfortunately, these same instructors felt there was a lack of training and support for themselves and others with similar jobs. CUE SF was created to address these needs. The beginnings were grounded on grassroots organizing. Kameny compiled a list of the tech teachers in the San Francisco Unified School District. She then created a Yahoo group called “sftechteach” as a platform for educators throughout the district to share ideas and resources. CUE SF leaders also organized “after school” meetings, which occurred every couple of months. A different teacher hosted the events in their respective computer labs. Participants gathered to discuss projects and share resources.

While informal meetings were successful, the idea of creating an official non-profit was daunting. Fortunately, Jan Half ’s tireless networking made the seemingly insurmountable an actual possibility. Half connected CUE SF with a pro-bono attorney who helped the organization become an affiliate. Kameny and McGarrah are grateful for the mentorship and support from veteran CUE members including Half, Diana Paradise, and Suzanne Mitchell. After earning affiliate status last July, McGarrah and Kameny hosted a very well-attended launch party last September and a “CUE brew” in November.

The community response has been impressive and membership is growing at a rapid rate. CUE SF leaders noted that peer support and networking form the foundation of the organization. CUE SF is the place for educators to share, compare, and learn to redesign current technology-based practices for the benefit of their students.

CUE SF leaders are currently leveraging local support. Regional high-tech companies and the City of San Francisco are eager to partner with public schools. In response, leaders are planning an “Appi-hour” on local radio and television station, KQED. This program is designed to connect application developers with San Francisco teachers. CUE SF also plans to provide technology training to teachers on new equipment like iPad carts. CUE

CUE SF: Newest CUE Affliate

CUE SF Co-Presidents Susan Kameny and Karen McGarrah

2014 BOARD OF DIRECTORS CANDIDATESMeet the Board of Directors Candidates on Friday and Saturday in the HUB@CUE at the Annual CUE Conference in Palm Springs, before the raffle. Ballots available to current members of CUE from midnight on March 22 - 5pm on April 24, 2014. www.cue.org/election

Jason Borgen

Affiliate Nominated - Monterey Bay CUEProgram Director, TICALSanta Cruz County Office of EducationSanta Cruz, CA

Lila Wills Bronson

Affiliate Nominated - San Gabriel Valley CUEAssistant Superintendent, Educational ServicesNorwalk-La Mirada Unified School District Shadow Hills, CA

Ray Chavez

IncumbentDirector, Instructional Technology OutreachLos Angeles County Office of EducationWest Covina, CA

Michele Dawson

Affiliate Nominated - North Bay CUEEducational Technology Supervisor,San Francisco Unified School DistrictSan Francisco, CA

Lainie Rowell

IncumbentK-20 Professional Developer and LEC Coordinator,Huntington Beach, CA

Cynthia Sistek-Chandler

Affiliate Nominated - San Diego CUEAssociate Professor,National UniversitySan Diego, CA


The value of teaching coding in school is obvious to many administrators. Over 75% believe coding should either be a requirement or an elective for students. This, according to a recent survey given to administrators across the state of California representing CUE’s AdminSIG members, the TICAL Leadership Cadre, and various other administrative groups. Though we may be preaching to the choir with the 50 respondents, the data provides a realistic view of the benefits, concerns, and trends in district and/or schoolwide coding programs.

The Alliance for California Computing Education for Students and Schools (ACCESS: access.ics.uci.edu/) exclaims, “The benefits of computer science education go beyond the skills and knowledge acquired

Bits and Bytes: Administrator’s Corner Jason Borgen

in the classroom; it opens students’ eyes to career possibilities in fields they didn’t even know existed, both inside and outside the information technology sector.” The survey reveals that 84% agree or strongly agree coding courses can prepare students for a possible career path in computer science. Do we want to help to develop this pathway in our schools? Do we need more reasons to provide such offerings?

Benefits of Coding Programs From the creation of Pong to the development of Facebook, we know that the mindset of a programmer entails deep thought and high amounts of creativity as they attempt to develop a program, object, or task that is unique. There is no surprise that 86% of the respondents agree or strongly agree that coding courses promote creativity. As students design programs and begin to code, even using the simple drag and drop visual program (for elementary and middle school) known as Scratch (scratch.mit.edu), their objective is to develop a seamless product—even though, after writing a few lines of code (or hundreds of lines, many times), things are not perfect after the first go at it. The term “debugging” refers to the ability to identify and remove errors. It takes a great deal of problem solving to do this. Again, no surprise, over 90% of respondents agree that coding

courses help to develop effective problem solvers. As we move towards completing one-fifth of the 21st Century, we need to think critically about relevant skills students need to be active democratic citizens in a digitally driven society. Is coding a life skill? Fifty-eight percent of respondents think that it is essential for full participation in society. So why are coding courses slow to be deployed in our comprehensive K-12 system?

According to a change.org petition (chn.ge/1fsHpnk), “Computer science courses do not currently count towards core high school graduation requirements in California. Moreover, neither the University of California (UC) nor the California State University (CSU) campuses count computer science as satisfying a mathematics or science requirement towards admission.” Perhaps this is why the results of the survey revealed that only 30% offer coding as a requirement or an elective. There is a gap in what can be beneficial to students and what policy says meets college and career-readiness. There are also logistical issues with creating such programs. Thus, there are some real concerns among administrators.

Creativity, Problem Solving, Career-Readiness: Administrators’ Perspectives

Toward Coding In K12 Schools

Continued on page 20


Bits and Bytes: Administrator’s Corner John Cradler

Unanticipated Consequences of LCFF: With the flexibility offered by LCFF, districts have almost complete discretion on allocating state funding—as long as it addresses education. The State Board of Education and the Legislature are expecting that districts will use LCFF and other funding, such as the funds provided to support implementation of CCSS, to raise the achievement of “high-need” students. Yet, in reality, some districts are under pressure to use flexible funds for a wide variety of other local demands to include teacher-salary increases, reduced class size, technology infrastructure, and teacher professional development. The result is that major inequities will occur in that some districts may meet local needs while using the new state funding for CCSS and the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium (SBAC) assessment system, while others will need to use the new flexible funding to address critical local needs and be responsive to local collective bargaining units.

While LCFF has resulted in increased local funding levels, it has caused over 30 other state-funded programs to be eliminated. Now that time has passed since LCFF was instituted, many educators and some legislators are realizing that an unanticipated consequence of LCFF is that programs eliminated or block granted into LCFF that addressed specific critical and documented past, current, and future needs have been overlooked. Some of these include educational technology, Regional Opportunity Programs (ROP), and adult education. For example, since CTAP and SETS have been almost eliminated or significantly reduced in most regions of the state, there has been an increased demand for technology support brought on by the emergence of CCSS and the related SBAC assessment system. Rural and small school districts are the first to lose these regional services because large districts tend to be able to continue to fund their own technology support.

The need for equity of services: The major reason that CTAP and SETS were established was to increase equity of resources across all districts because of the need to access and use technology to support and extend teaching and learning opportunities. In fact, evaluation over the past ten years showed that CTAP regional services tended to fill the gaps where districts and county offices of education did not have the staff and other resources needed to provide these services. For example, it is currently being found that without regional CTAP services, many

districts do not have the staff and knowledge needed to apply for Federal E-Rate discounts as well as a variety of other state and federal funding related to technology. The elimination of SETS reduces or removes access to information about electronic learning and online resources aligned to Common Core Standards, statewide policy and administrative information needed to plan and implement technology, and the online technical assistance needed to support the use of technology. It is becoming increasingly clear that with the implementation of CCSS and SBAC technology-assisted assessments, the need for technology support services has greatly increased.

Addressing the need to continue technology support: As discussed in prior OnCUE articles, Senator Hanabeth Jackson (Santa Barbara), introduced legislation (SB 505) sponsored by the California Department of Education (CDE) to continue funding for CTAP and SETS with some adjustments to ensure focus on CCSS. This bill did not receive sufficient initial support; however, it is anticipated that Senator Jackson will continue her efforts. CUE provided formal support for SB 505, with members testifying before the Senate Education Committee in support of the bill.

Assembly Member Susan Bonilla (Contra Costa), author of AB 484, the bill to authorize implementation of the technology-supported assessment system, conducted a roundtable event in Mountain View in October, 2013, to address this need. She suggested that without technology support, the implementation of the SBAC assessment system could be greatly jeopardized. The Roundtable concluded that a clear focus on the critical need to provide the types of services to schools offered by CTAP and SETS is needed for planning and implementation of both CCSS and the Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) initiative. Barbara Nemko and John Cradler, CUE Legislative Advocacy Committee members, represented CUE at this meeting.

The soon to be released California Blueprint for Educational Technology will provide additional information to document and support the need for a wide variety of state-supported policies and possible services to include technology support for CCSS and SBAC assessments. The Blueprint recommends increasing the role of the CDE in supporting

Local Control and the Future of Educational Technology in California

Background: The Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) combined with the demands for educational technology support resulting from the implementation of Common Core State Standards (CCSS) and the related computer-assisted Smarter Balanced student assessment system have given rise to an uncertain future regarding availability of educational technology information resources and services in California. As mentioned in prior OnCUE articles, LCFF has shifted funding to districts from current educational technology support systems: the California Technology Assistance Projects (CTAP) and the Statewide Educational Technology Services (SETS)—which includes the California Learning Resource Network (CLRN), Technology Information Center for Administrative Leadership (TICAL), and the online technology help desk (TechSETS).


technology by adding a senior level CDE administrative person to be in charge of educational technology. Also, it is well known that State Superintendent Tom Torlakson is a strong supporter for technology to support teaching and learning in that when he was a Senator, he authored legislation to re-authorize CTAP and SETS, and as State Superintendent, he established the Educational Technology Task Force.

Conclusion: The state-established implementation of CCSS and the SBAC technology-assisted standards-based student performance assessments is the CDE’s current most important priority for K-12 education. For example, the state just awarded a $51 million dollar contract to Educational Testing Service (ETS) to design and launch the SBAC assessment system. Thus, it seems that while LCFF is important in allowing local districts to determine how they want to allocate their funding, it can result in reduced equity of services and resources for those individual schools and districts that cannot cost effectively provide them on their own. For this reason, the State Board of Education and the Legislature should revisit programs swept away by LCFF and reassess the current and future need for some of these programs—especially CTAP and SETS—and other possible ways to address the need for equitable technology access and support. The implication is that the original need for some of the “categorical” programs such as CTAP is re-emerging and should be re-visited in order to ensure greater equity of educational technology services and information resources across all school districts in Califoernia. CUE

John Cradler is President of Educational Support Systems and Co-Chair of the CUE Legislative Advocacy Committee. He has been actively involved in developing policy and legislative proposals for educational technology at the state and national levels for the past 25 years. He has been conducting formative and summative statewide evaluations of

the state-funded California Technology Assistance Projects (CTAP) and Statewide Educational Technology Services (SETS) for the State Department of Education and Legislature, and is conducting an in-depth study of the impact of the Enhancing Education Through Technology (EETT) grants on teaching and learning. He has served as Director of Technology for WestEd, the Council of Chief State School Officers, a Teacher Education and Computing Center (TECC), and the South San Francisco Unified School District. John was awarded CUE’s 2010 Legislative Advocacy Award, and was also named ISTE’s 2010 Public Policy Advocate. [email protected] www.cue.org/advocacy

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Concerns about Coding Programs With the Common Core taking our schools by storm, coding and computer science initiatives have not been a so-called “priority” area for many school district leaders, though conversations about programming curricula are happening. Forty-six percent of respondents do agree or strongly agree CCSS alignment is a valid concern; interestingly enough, 24% can’t decide. So what are some concerns? Staffing, of course! Well, 92% of survey respondents think so. There are great teachers out there, but hiring effective instructional facilitators in coding and computer science is a new paradigm for many. With the reality of the Common Core, as well as the Next Generation Science Standards, integrating such courses into the curriculum takes some creativity and forward-thinking governance and leadership. This is probably why more than two-thirds of survey respondents mentioned scheduling as a concern. How can we learn from the other third or so schools and districts?

From Computer Science week and the Hour of Code (csedweek.org), to change.org petitions, there is a growing awareness and emphasis on coding and computer science. When survey respondents were asked on a scale from 1-5 if they were aware of programming resources with 1 being none and 5 being many, 68% gave a score of 3 and above. Resource collection is a start to leading a systematic deployment of an effective CS (computer science) program. Obtaining buy-in, recruiting staff, and integrating into existing curriculum will be the next step in the transformation. Fullerton middle school principal, Matthew Barnett, mentions, “I think that coding is hugely important for students in the 21st Century. It’s a kind of literacy that students need to be exposed to.

It’s like a woodshop class, in many regards, because it gives the students an opportunity to create real projects with a real purpose. If we can connect it to other areas of the curriculum, like math, to make it less abstract, then that’s even better. I just think we need to find a way to integrate it rather than having it as a totally separate class.”

Although, 40% of survey respondents’ schools or districts still do not offer any form of coding, the movement is on the rise as districts ponder CCSS integration as well as the societal implications of digital literacy and creativity. Elementary principal Rod Federwisch says, ”I believe that our students will need to be educated in coding. If not, they will simply be technology consumers.” Do we want to produce a mostly consuming society or a developing society? CUE

Jason Borgen is Program Director for the Technology Information Center for Administrative Leadership (TICAL), a statewide education technology service funded by the California Department of Education under guidance by the Santa Cruz County Office of Education. Jason presents at regional, statewide, and national conferences on leadership and learning with

technology. Jason is a Google Certified Teacher, Leading Edge Certified for Online Teaching, Administrator, and Professional Developer. Jason is co-president of Monterey Bay CUE, and co-chair of CUE’s AdminSIG. [email protected]

Continued from page 17

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When the students in this year’s Web Design class were slow to get motivated with updating the school’s website, I realized I needed to provide them with another pathway other than informational writing or creating multimedia projects.

I had been kicking around the idea of adding code writing to the class for a year, and knew that I was more interested in helping the students learn HTML/CSS code from the ground up rather than mastering a coding editor such as Adobe Dreamweaver.

Since we were at the infancy of our coding experiment, I did not want to use school funds for an untested programming curriculum. Additionally, from my background in educational technology, I knew I desired interactive tutorials rather than those teaching through text or video instructions.

The advanced students in the school’s Technology Club are heavily invested in hardware and networking, but have also dabbled in code work. They directed me to Bento (www.bentobox.io/), a wonderful repository of coding tutorials.

I showed my Web Design students a couple motivational videos from Code.org that point out that a love of problem solving and perseverance in a person’s personality is far more important than her grades or intelligence when predicting someone will become a successful coder. My students were also impressed to learn that a coder may immediately get their foot in the door of a local (less than an hour away) technology company, for a solid entry salary, and without a college degree.

Combining the information from Bento with a few Internet searches, I quickly learned Code Academy (www.codecademy.com) has been the industry standard for free, introductory, interactive coding tutorials. I was awestruck at how quickly my students immediately took to the course lessons. My previously unmotivated students were now coming in during the break, logging in before the bell rang, and coding the entire period without talking to each

Tech Coordinator Craig Miller

Guide On The Side, or How I Learned To Stop Worrying and Love Accept

Knowing Less Than My Students

other about anything other than providing assistance when someone got stuck within a lesson. Also inspiring to me was that 99% of my students stated they enjoyed coding, including both those on the college track, and those who were not on pace for graduating with their class.

When Code.org announced the Hour of Code (code.org/learn), my Web Design students immediately began working through the self-contained one-hour lessons. They shared a Google Document with each other, complete with a color-coded key identifying their review for each lesson. Through this process, they agreed upon developing a “high” skill level JavaScript lesson, a “medium” skill level JavaScript lesson, and an “easy” visual coding lesson.

These three levels of offerings were then turned into an Hour of Code Assignment (cue.tc/AptosCode) for the Freshman Computer Literacy Classes. My Web Design students already delighted in the fact that they were better coders than me; however, they now also take a great deal of pride in having shaped the event we hosted on December 10, 2013. After a month of pre-testing and selecting tutorials, the Freshman computer lab saw 200+ students smoothly run through the coding lessons and give positive feedback regarding the experience.

Using Bento and the companies who provided free lessons for the Hour of Code, my next step was to choose a few of the most common coding languages—HTML/CSS, JavaScript, Python, and Ruby—and set up head-to-head competitions (cue.tc/AptosCompetition) for my coders to determine which companies had created the best tutorial sequences. My Web Design students have taken this task very seriously, as evidenced by the number of

Web Design class at Aptos High.


I see coding as a way to level the playing field at my school that

focuses so heavily on the college track.

disagreements between students who challenge each other’s preferred tutorials. These disagreements among previously uninterested students have resulted in students arguing their points using highly specific justifications.

My students know their work and opinions are valued by me because they:

a) have a greater expertise for this project than I do.

b) are creating the learning sequences for next year’s students, as evidenced by the deletion of the lower-rated tutorials from the competitions based directly upon their arguments.

c) are helping to determine whether Coding will ultimately split off from Web Design and become a future class unto itself.

Coming to a comprehensive high school from alternative education, I value differentiated instruction and feel the most fulfilled when a low achieving student engages in a project and creates something she did not know was inside her. I see coding as a way to level the playing field at my school that focuses so heavily on the college track. Here are skill-based lessons I can offer my low achieving students who now exude a rarely felt academic confidence in class because they realize coding does not require them to compete with the prior knowledge possessed by the students achieving higher levels of academic success.

For my part, I would absolutely love to participate in the Code Year (cue.tc/CodeAcademyYear); however, during the academic school year, I do not have as much discretionary time as my students. I have always prided myself in being an overly prepared instructor. Many late nights are spent testing new ideas and tweaking lessons to perfection so that I have a plan as well as a backup plan in case of “technical difficulties.” In short, I have relished my role as the “Sage On The Stage,” supreme master of all the knowledge existing within the realm of my classroom.

Aptos High computer literacy freshmen show off their Hour of Code certificates.

I am now trying to come to terms with the fact that Bento alone displays nearly 100 different coding languages. For me, the plethora of different coding languages provides me with relief. If there were only 5-10 languages, I might attempt to learn them all. A hundred languages means I cannot possibly be expected to master all of them. I am now resting easier and easier knowing that my job is to guide students through their own exploration and mastery of the various coding languages rather than being able to solve each of their problems for them. Thankfully, new companies are going online all the time that understand my time crunch as a teacher with 3.5 preps. LearnStreet (www.learnstreet.com), for example, offers nearly 24/7 chat support for students when they get frustrated. My students are currently putting the LearnStreet tutorials through their paces with generally positive reviews.

I possess only a fuzzy picture of where our school’s technology program is heading from where we currently reside; however, working as a team to solve new problems is precisely what excites me the most about teaching and subsequently leads to my most creative instruction. Now I just have to come to terms with the fact that it is unlikely to be “direct instruction.” CUE

Craig Miller is a Technology Instructor at Aptos High School, Aptos, CA, and District Tech Liaison for the Pajaro Valley Unified School District. [email protected]

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While Logo developed a following, it never became part of the accepted culture of educational computing at large. It is, however, by no means dead. Logo has grown in two directions to reflect Papert’s idea that Logo had no floor and no ceiling—there was no barrier to entry, or limit to what could be done with the language. Two examples that show this are MIT’s Scratch language (scratch.mit.edu), and Northwestern University’s NetLogo project (ccl.northwestern.edu/netlogo). Scratch uses jigsaw pieces to assemble program elements, allowing it to be used by young students. NetLogo supports the modeling of large systems (flocks of birds, insect colonies, etc.) and is used heavily by graduate students in many disciplines all over the world.

Today’s challengeLiving as we are, in a world rich with existing programs, one easily can go through life without having to write a single line of code. This does a disservice to our students, though. The skills they develop in

writing their own software lead to productive strategies in the solving of problems of all kinds. Fortunately, the current focus on STEM skills affords an opportunity to embrace student programming as an activity that makes sense at almost all grades. In my view, this would be quite beneficial. CUE

Dr. Thornburg has been involved in computers since the late 1960’s, and has written dialects of the language PILOT (another language for young users) and Prolog (a theorem-proving language that is an alternate to LISP). He is the author of numerous

books on Logo and used to speak extensively on this topic at CUE conferences in the early 1980’s. His current work in staff development focuses on the Next Generation Science Standards and the Common Core State Standards of mathematics. [email protected]

Continued from page 5

Future Annual CUE Conferences:March 19-21, 2015March 17-19, 2016


A Roundtable Discussion About CCSS: What’s Involved and How Do We Get There?

Part I

On IT with CETPA Lisa Kopochinski

“On IT with CETPA” is a regular column that provides voice to K-12 IT professionals throughout California, and is a direct result of the

partnership between CUE and CETPA (California Educational Technology Professionals Association). In exchange, CUE leaders write the “CUE View,” a column that appears in Databus, CETPA’s quarterly journal.

According to the Common Core State Standards website at www.corestandards.org, the mission of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) is to “provide a consistent, clear understanding of what students are expected to learn, so teachers and parents know what they need to do to help them. The standards are designed to be robust and relevant to the real world, reflecting the knowledge and skills that our young people need for success in college and careers. With American students fully prepared for the future, our communities will be best positioned to compete successfully in the global economy.”

While this goal is a lofty one, many believe it is achievable. However, few argue that it will take some time to navigate the hurdles involved.

CETPA’s DataBus editor recently sat down with the following individuals—Thomas Tan, Director, Network and Computer Services for the Hacienda La Puente Unified School District; Jim Klein, Director, Information Services and Technology for the Saugus Union School District; David Thurston, Information Technology Directorfor the Colton Joint Unified School District; Luke Hibbard, Coordinator, CTAP 6-California Technology Assistance Project with the Stanislaus County Office of Education; and Kelley Day and Christine Sisco, BTSA Induction Consultants from the Instructional Services Division at the Stanislaus County Office of Education—to get their take on CCSS and what it means to their district and county office in terms of interpretation and preparation as well as the challenges involved. Here is what they had to say.

What do you consider the main benefit to your district of implementing Common Core State Standards?

Thomas Tan: I’d have to say the main benefit is the goal to graduate high school students who are college and career ready. It’s a goal that we can all rally around and support—students, educators, parents, and the community. The last five years of the great recession have been particularly nasty. Data has shown the value of post-secondary education for people to weather rough economic times. Future career opportunities that we can foresee point to growth in careers in science, technology, engineering, and math backgrounds. The power in “common” is that we can now borrow resources developed by teachers in other states using the Common Core State Standards. It’s a competitive world. Our students are not just competing with the kids in the neighboring district for opportunities. CCSS helps us all pull in the same direction.

Jim Klein: I would say the biggest benefit of the CCSS is the weaving of authentic technology use throughout all of the academic disciplines, which is further driving our efforts to implement ever-greater, more effective use of technology in the learning space. When the standards describe students who “use technology and digital media strategically and capably,” they are not describing the sort of technology “as an add-on” or content delivery mechanism that has plagued ed tech across the country. Instead such statements demand deeper, richer, more thoughtful strategies for technology in the learning space.

David Thurston: From a curriculum perspective, the depth and rigor required by the CCSS is going to significantly enrich our students’ educational experience. This will better prepare them with the critical thinking skills necessary for their college and career choices, while also providing more opportunities for project- and process-based learning. As far as IT and ed tech is concerned, the CCSS provides the greatest opportunity yet to further integrate technology into the classroom.

“Anyone can AND SHOULD know how to code. It is the universal language of our digital future.”


Under the CCSS, technology is no longer a subject supplement or an enhancement employed by only a few “techy” teachers. It’s now a requirement that will be foundational to teaching, learning, and assessment in all classrooms. This will drive the district to make organization-wide resource commitments to provide teachers and students the ed tech tools and training they need to meet the demands of the new standards.

Luke Hibbard: There will be greater teaching in depth rather than covering more topics in less time. This encourages students to use their critical thinking and problem-solving skills in addition to asking students to translate ideas, concepts, and skills into the 4 Cs of 21st Century skills. The 4 Cs speak to communication, collaboration (new emphasis in CCSS on the speaking and listening standards, which are integral to working with classmates, co-workers and customers in a worldwide arena), critical thinking, and creativity. Preparations of lessons need to be more thoughtful to address all levels of Depth of Knowledge (DOK 1-4).

Kelley Day: Right. And this all weaves nicely together with the Standards for Mathematical Practice, which encourage the same qualities in the area of math (also meshes with Next Gen Science and Next Gen ELD standards). There are many cross-curricular benefits, which include ideas such as writing in all content areas (including math, PE, music, etc.), reading critically, and applying information to extended situations—for example, taking information read in a technical manual and applying that to a real life/hands-on situation. Technology integration is not just for presentation of lessons, but embedded within Common Core. Students are being encouraged to be technologically fluent in all arenas (research, publishing, problem solving, public speaking, etc.). All of the above is working toward making students college and career ready and subsequently more productive and employable citizens.

How is your district preparing for the implementation of CCSS?

Thomas Tan: Now that’s the million-dollar question. CCSS is new for everyone, so we’ve been using every bit of information we can get our hands on to map the way forward. We have worked with our assessment people to conduct online pilot tests at schools sites. Our business, instructional, and technology people have been meeting weekly to focus just on Common Core. Having all the functional groups and departments around the same planning table has been very useful. We all hear the same info and can anticipate future issues early on and work on solutions. Attending the CETPA regional group meetings has been a great source of information on how other districts are handling online assessments and classroom technology. The CETPA statewide listserv has also been an invaluable source for an ongoing running flow of discussion about CCSS.

David Thurston: First and foremost, we’re training teachers on the new standards. Colton has made the commitment to train all of our teachers in the new ELA and Math standards by 2015. We’ve been

hosting regular (three to four times a week) CCSS staff development sessions and will continue to do so for next the next two years. Additionally, our Curriculum Council and Educational Services Departments are preparing for new and much-needed CCSS aligned textbook adoptions scheduled for next year. On the technology front, we’re completing our district-wide wireless network rollout and refreshing the majority of our network infrastructure so that we can handle the expected increase in bandwidth/access demands. On the ed tech side, we’re starting the implementation of Google Apps for Education (GAFE) this year, and we plan on selecting an official Learning Management System. I expect that both of these systems will play a large role in enabling the collaboration and project-based learning that the new standards will require.

Jim Klein: Our district is marshaling all of our expertise across the entire array of departments, working together to meet the demands of the new standards and testing requirements. A key strategy of ours has been to be involved from the get-go with the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium (SBAC) pilot program. We participated in both the early and late rounds. These pilots enabled us to evaluate not only our technology capabilities and needs, but also the demands and expectations of the tests on our students. These experiences have aided tremendously in our development of strategies for the learning environment. In addition, we’ve engaged a number of educational services and technology committees, with plenty of cross-pollination, to deconstruct standards, build/collect resources, and set strategies for the future.

Christine Sisco: As a county office we are supporting 26 districts in the roll out of these new standards. All departments are working together to further our districts’ implementation of CCSS (Instructional Support Services, CTAP, BTSA/SpEd Induction). Throughout 2012-2013, our County Office Instructional Support Services division hosted the CCSS Leadership Institute, which introduced districts to the CCSS and how they are structured. This five-day academy helped districts create an implementation plan for the 2013-2014 school year and beyond. Districts brought key players to the Institute such as teacher leaders, educational coaches, administrators, and curriculum coordinators. And last summer, the ISS team hosted a county-wide conference titled “Splash into Common Core,” which gave participants both the opportunity to “DIP” (two days of 90-minute workshops focused on implementation of common core and practical classroom application) and “DIVE” (three-day intensive workshops which allowed participants to dive deeper into specific standards by grade level in ELA and Math). The “DIVE” sessions are being reoffered throughout the 2013-2014 school year. The Technology and Learning Resources division supports the ISS team in helping districts craft vision and effective uses of technology to reach the Depth of Knowledge required of the new standards. CUE

Lisa Kopochinski is a veteran journalist who has extensive experience writing and editing publications in a wide variety of industries in both the U.S. and Canada. She has been the editor for CETPA’s Databus magazine for more than 10 years. [email protected] www.lisakcommunications.net

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Title: Hands on CraftsPublisher: Mint Museums and the Public Library of Charlotte and MecklenburgGrades: 3 - 6Media Type: Photos and/or Images, Sound Recordings and Audio, Special Requirements (broadband access, plugins, etc.) URL: cue.tc/HandsOnCraftsOER: Reference / Free Tool The website provides a virtual art studio where students can create various works of art (clay, quilts, clothing, etc.) and learn about the steps and tools required for each process. Studio 1 contains North Carolina Road Trips that provides links to museums where students can view pottery, quilting, weaving, and basketry; The Clay Lab has pottery facts; Mud Works Gallery includes current exhibits of mud works; and The Clay Studio has detailed directions for creating a slab self-portrait. Studio 2 has detailed information and examples about basket weaving, quilting, and weaving.

Title: 123D Make IntroPublisher: Autodesk, IncGrades: 7-12Media Type: Photos and/or Images, Written Materials/Other Printed TextsURL: cue.tc/MakeIntroOER: Apps iOS123D Make Intro allows students to create 2D patterns from a 3D model. This iOS application provides an introduction to the free desktop Mac software (available at the Mac App store) and includes a revolver tool and a sampling of patterns available in the full desktop version. CUE

The CUE Review Melody McGill

The California Learning Resource Network (CLRN) is a statewide education technology service of the California Department of Education, administrated by the Stanislaus County Office of Education, Brian Bridges, Director. Search the CLRN database at clrn.org. Permission is hereby granted to California educators to copy this material for instructional use. The document may not be distributed for profit. Melody McGill, CLRN Review Coordinator [email protected]

Title: Turtle PondPublisher: IlluminationsGrades: 3 - 6Media Type: Photos and/or Images, Sound Recordings and Audio, Special Requirements (broadband access, plugins, etc.), Written Materials/Other Printed TextsURL: cue.tc/TurtlePondOER: Secondary SourceStudents estimate length and angle measurements. Students enter a sequence of LOGO commands to help the turtle get to the pond. Children can write their own solutions using LOGO commands and input them into the computer. The turtle then moves and leaves a trail or path according to the instructions given. Interactive Math Tools are Java applets that can be used to explore math and create interactive lessons. They are provided by the Illuminations site, which is designed to bring alive the ideas and recommendations set forth in the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics’ Principles and Standards for School Mathematics, and contains an array of Internet resources that can be used to improve the teaching and learning of mathematics.

Title: AlicePublisher: Carnegie Mellon UniversityGrades: 6 - 12Media Type: Photos and/or Images, Sound Recordings and Audio, Special Requirements (broadband access, plugins, etc.), Video, Written Materials/Other Printed TextsURL: www.alice.orgOER: Free Software/Web Tools, Productivity, Drawing/PaintingAlice is a 3D programming environment resource that makes it easy to create an animation for telling a story, play an interactive game, or create a video to share on the web. Alice is a teaching tool for introductory computing. It uses 3D graphics and a drag-and-drop interface to facilitate a more engaging, less frustrating first programming experience. Elements of this application must be downloaded and installed on a local computer for use.

Make the Turtle Do What??!! And Other Creative Possibilities

“For this week’s assignment, load your program and then program your turtle to create a design within a square box. Once the design is completed, have the turtle create a quilt of repeating squares.” Those were the directions for the programming assignment I was given. The challenge: I had no idea of how to get the turtle to move, much less create a design in a square. However, failure was not an option! Many days of anguish, phone calls to my cadre mates, and frustration later, my turtle moved in the box creating a design. The instructor’s feedback, “You have a unique way of programming!” The program went something like this: forward 5, back 2, forward 3, turn left 30, turn left 40, turn right 10, forward 8, back 1, back 3, forward 1, turn right, turn left. I think you have the picture, my turtle moved like someone learning to drive a car for the first time: lurching forward and backward until the square design was completed. Programming is never easy, but can bring wonderful rewards when the program works correctly. This edition of reviews brings you a group of websites that involve programming, crafting and/or building. The “Turtle Pond” brought back fond memories of my turtle project. Enjoy! Create and build away!

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OnCUE program skills to build routines in Cargo Bot. Meanwhile, Lego Mindstorms, code.org, codehs, and more allow middle schoolers and above to begin stretching their programming knowledge