Planning the activity (1000 words)

Name of the activity
Bee-Spell me!

Year Level
Year 1

Identified Learning Area

o   E.g. History, English, Arts

 
English and Digital Technologies

Student prior understandings

o   How much experience have students already had this technology?

o   Are they beginners, have they used this technology before etc.

·         Students are aware of the program on the Bee-Bots.

·         Students have previously used it before on an alphabet mat and completely understand the button functions and its purpose.

·         Additionally, Intensive prior knowledge of the context of this activity (the story of “the dress up box”)

Learning objectives

o   What do you want the students to achieve?

o   E.g. For the students to ……….

The main objective of this activity is to get students to understand that a computer (Bee-Bot) will follow precise commands and will respond to those commands.  Additionally, students will be able to effectively implement simple programming to practice new vocabulary introduced in “The Dress up Box” story.

Connection to the Australian Curriculum

o   Include one descriptor from your learning area and one from the technologies

o   Copy and paste the descriptors (no reference needed)

Digital Technologies:

Follow, describe and represent a sequence of steps and decisions (algorithms) needed to solve simple problems (ACTDIP004) – Elaboration: writing and entering a simple set of instructions jointly to sequence events and instructions,

English:

Use comprehension strategies to build literal and inferred meaning about key events, ideas and information in texts that they listen to, view and read by drawing on growing knowledge of context, text structures and language features (ACELY1660) – Elaboration: building knowledge about the topic of the text and learning new vocabulary before, during and after reading

Explanation of activity

o   What will you do?

o   What will the students be doing?

Introduction of activity:

·         This activity is based off a story of which students have read on multiple occasions “The Dress up Box”.

·         This activity consists of students trying to spell the new vocabulary they are exposed to from the story.

Equipment:

·         Ideally, students will be working in pairs than in groups.

Therefore, there is a need for:

·         Multiple of Bee-bots

·         Multiple of alphabet mats

·         Student’s workbook

·         Pencils

Teacher:

·         In the beginning of class, the teacher will demonstrate the task with the Bee-Bot as a whole class demonstration.

·         Students will be gathered around the teacher on the floor as the teacher briefly remind students of the program and functions of the Bee-Bot

·         Teacher will write a few vocabs from the storybook on the board for students to start spelling on the alphabet mat.

For example:

·         Frog

·         Bird

·         Horse

·         Pig

·         Ant

·         Box

·         Work

·         Game

·         Truck

·         As students begin the activity, the teacher will begin walking around to ensure proper use of the Bee-Bot is implemented.

·         The teacher will also incorporate open ended and closed ended questions as they walk around.

·         “What would you do to the Bee-bot now?”

·         “How many spaces do we need to make it move forward/backward etc.?”

·         “What button should I press now?”

Students:

·         Students will be working in pairs, taking turn in spelling different vocabulary on the alphabet mat.

·         Students will be working collaboratively to ensure they code the Bee-bot appropriately to correctly spell the word.

·         Students will be looking through the alphabet mat to find the correct letters that spell out their chosen word correctly.

·         Then, students will write down the code/pattern in their workbooks before they begin implementing it on the Bee-Bot

·         Students are welcome to choose other vocabularies from the storybook

·         *** an extension for students, is to use longer words for a harder establishment of a Bee-Bot code***

For example:

·         Haunted

·         Favourite

·         Marshmallows

·         Chocolates

 

Pedagogical choices including

o   Strategies you have chosen to engage students

o   Theories you have drawn from using evidence from the literature (refs needed)

o   Base it of these:

o   Technological knowledge

o   Pedagogical knowledge

o   Contextual knowledge

Some examples (you do not have to use those, use better ideas if you can):

Collaborative learning

Hands on

Digital incorporated

Repetition of vocabs

Giving students the choice

Importance to provide an extension for students

Rationale for the technology (MAJOR, IMPORTANT PART)

o   Affordances of the technology

o   Why this technology is a good choice for the curriculum area

o   Why is it better than other technologies?

o   Find evidence from the literature that this technology improves learning

o   Other technologies you considered and why did you choose this technology?

o   TPACK KNOWLEDGE

Affordances:

A bee-bot is a good investment, at a cost of under $100, it brings endless learning potential to the students.

Why it is a good choice:

It is exciting and intriguing to the child

Allows children to communicate and interact

Children also learn with their peers without realising it.

Why is it better than other technologies:

It gives the students learning opportunities in the early years i.e. literacy, math, developing social and communication skills.

Working in groups also fosters collaboration

Other technologies considered:

·         Flash cards

·         Videos

·         Audio presentation

The bee-bot was chosen as it gives the children more engagement and allows them to share ideas and collectively come up with solutions to the challenges that they may be presented with by this technology.

Assessment

o   How will you evaluate if the learning objectives have been met?

o   Formative and Summative

o   Informal or formal

Some examples: (you do not have to use those, use better ideas if you can):

Evaluation:

Teacher observation

Peer observation/assessment (keeping each other accountable)

Students ability to demonstrate the fundamental movements that they need, to make the bee-bot perform the task

Formative assessment:

The teacher will have the class taught lessons progressively. After each lesson, the teacher will assess whether the students have captured the lesson adequately

Summative assessment:

The teacher will test student knowledge about a previously learned concept such as addition, subtraction and the alphabet.

Students ability to correctly spell out a word using the alphabet mat

Informal assessment:

The teacher will look at the performance of the children on how they are learning from the bee-bot and records of progress will be kept on file fore review.

Formal assessment:

The teacher will test the students on the activities that can be learnt with the bee-bot to have a record of actual performance of each child.

Safety and ethical considerations

o   Physical

o   Digital

Physical safety

The teacher will ensure safe use of the bee-bot by moving around the classroom to ensure that the children are using it correctly.

Digital safety

The Bee-bot has little or no digital risk

Practical considerations

o   Timing/setup

o   Cost

Timing/setup

The teacher will set up the Bee-bot to make it ready for use by the children

Cost

The bee-bot is current costing up to 49pounds on eBay

 

Reference list

Example of learning activity (if this is a video, please save it in Google drive, share it to anyone at Monash with the link, and post the link here.)

Leave this one for me to do and record of the activity.

Unit reflection

The adoption of technology in education continues to disrupt the educational sector aiding the teachers and educators to provide better deliverables. It is important to note here that teaching strategies that use technology are deemed to be ethical as they facilitate the students to learn, boost their capacity as well as their productivity and capacity. It has been noted that integration of technology in education greatly inspires positive changes in teaching methods. Below are the lessons learnt in this unit.

Technology makes teaching easy

            Technology has the advantage of making teaching easy in the place of the instructors. For instance, the bee-bot naturally makes the students want to learn as it is intriguing and exciting. As such the students will not need to be pushed to learn as they are already interested in the robot which to them appears like a toy. As such, the students are learning without knowing and it and they enjoy it as much as they enjoy play.

Technology also helps to track the progress of the students

Through technology, it is also easier to track the progress that the children will be making through various assessments that include formative and informative assessments methods.

Positive environmental impact

            Technology has also been seen to have a positive impact on the environment. The use of the Bee-bot will prevent excess use of paper and plastic which would have a negative impact on the environment.

Students enjoy learning

With the young students addicted to games and television, the introduction of the Bee-bot to the classroom makes learning more exciting to the students. While presumably playing with the gadget the students will also be learning. Additionally, while working in pairs, the students will be able to share ideas and collaborate which is also enjoyable to the students