Last week, every student from Kindy to Year 6 participated in a grade-based Coding Day.
Students completed different activities throughout the day, which gave students an understanding of what coding is and helped to develop their computational thinking skills.
While working in small teams, students were introduced to binary code, created coding sequences to control robots and move objects on a computer screen, and developed their problem solving skills. Everyone had a different ‘favourite’ activity, although some popular highlights were the Bee-Bots, Spheros, Code-a-pillars, Scratch and getting to ‘code’ our friends through an outside maze. Not only did our students have fun, but they learned new skills and developed their capacity to persevere and work through problems, particularly if the first attempt wasn’t successful.
Some student reflections on Coding Day:
“I liked all of it!” – Georgia, Kindy
"The code-a-pillars were best. We had to put the bits of the caterpillar together to make it go. The bits have arrows on them to tell them which way to go." – Aryan, Year 1
“I liked the Bee-Bots. I liked that they did what you told them!” – Cierra, Year 2
“Both Scratch and the Spheros were my favourite. I had to keep working at the code over and over again.” – Tyler, Year 5
"We learned how to experiment with different types of code." – Annabel, Year 6
Miss Claire Donaldson
Year 5 Team Leader