Coding with students teaches them important skills in a subtle way. While creating in the app, students are trying to get their characters to appear, disappear, rotate and perform other actions. They learned academic and math vocabulary through project creation, no vocabulary list! If they wanted to make a character disappear, grow or move, then they figured out what the term meant. This type of learning will stick with them because it was learned on their own and applied to the work they were doing. Coding is a highly motivating activity for students that teaches them math skills and perseverance. During our project, students were engaged in all of the 4C's: Critical Thinking, Creativity, Collaboration and Communication.
Students drag programming code from the left to the workspace on the right |
Link to Curriculum
Examples of vocabulary terms acquired while coding: opacity, rotation, millisecond, x axis, y axis, scale, speed, width, percentage, anglesExamples of programming commands used while coding: rotate degrees, move distance, repeat loops, change x by, change y by, set position, set speed, wait in milliseconds, set opacity percent
Common Core State Standards Math Practices Addressed: CCSS.Math.Practice.MP1 Make sense of problems and persevere in solving them. CCSS.Math.Practice.MP2 Reason abstractly and quantitatively.
Student Project Examples |
Screen shot of a two-player, student created racing game to see which character makes it to the finish line first on this zig zag racing course |
Peyton explains his game: Rockets
Kati explains her game: Basketball