1- Activities for LITTLE ROBBIES (Children under 8 years old)
Codeweek4all: cw20-tFT40
Natalia, one of our Greek partners, has suggested some activities for young children:
A. Pixel Art
Give pupils the code, the grid and they have to find the hidden picture. Students first make- color their own image on an empty grid, then they write the code and give the code to another student. So, they can exchange images as pairs.
You may download the English pdf file on Natalia´s blog .
You can download the doc file in English here (Natalia)
If you want to create or discover images you can use https://www.zaplycode.it/
Watch a quick video I have created on how to create and download the images from zaplycode here (Natalia)
B- Scratch
Coding for all cw20-7eDR9.
There are some Scratch activities for beginners such as spinning- bouncing- changing colors names. Students insert elements of letters or draw their own letters in scratch, in a position that makes a message, their name, etc.
Using online scratch it will be easy to make the same instructions.
https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/334394284
https://nataliageorgitziki.blogspot.com/2019/09/code-week-animated-name.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DFAoBSHRgv4&feature=share&fbclid=IwAR1FqPxquTCfGd0owFhEEjXdS50auGMP-OrLaPPzELOWP6fO7BFbRqLeMno
2. Activity for ROB JUNIOR (pupils from 8 years old)
Coding for all cw20-7eDR9.
A. Machine Learning for Kids
Marlene, our Austrian partner has prepared the video about artificial intelligence and the activity on EU code week for ROB JUNIOR
If three of us take part and we send a report and some pictures, we will get a special certificate!!
I hope, some of you will find time to join the activity!
B. Scratch
Yildiz, one of our Turkish partners, suggest this activity to make animated letters that we may use for collaborative storytelling or animating personal names.
As part of the EU Code Week Activity, we animate the names of our pupils and the names of the project title on Scratch.
Our classroom on Scratch is "Rob and me 20". To get there, please follow the instructions:
1) Open this Link
2) Give yourself a username and a password (write it down!!!). Pupils do not choose their real names.
3) Close that page
4) Open the Website: ScratchmitEdu
5) Insert Username and Password and start to create a new project.
6) When the pupils finish their work, they have to make their project PUBLIC, otherwise, we can not see the project in our classroom.
7) Natalia posted a description of how to animate the names on Scratch, also Cards for the pupils to print and to work with.
8) Don't forget to add the project on the Code Week for All page!
Code: cw20-bw7kw
3.Activity for students from 10-12 years old
Activity code:cw20-7Wp25
ActivityTitle: Secret Code Bracelets
It is an activity for students 10-12 years old. The activity can take place in any classroom.
After expalaing to our students that the computer speaks another language from us ( machines: binary code so they understand only 0 an1 ) we give them a paper that all the letters of the English alphabet plus the special characters are in 0 and 1. We also give them black, white and coloured beads and a string. The black beads represent 0, the white beads are for 1 and we use the coloured ones to seperate the letters between the messages. The students write secret messages in the computer coding and they make bracelets and/or necklaces with the black and white beads. Then they give it to the student next to them that has to decode the message.
4.Activity for students from 4-7 years old
What is a robot? How do we imagine it?
Code4all:cw20-tFT40
It is an activity for students 4-7 years old students. The activity can take place in any classroom, and we need paper, colored pencils and a canson paper for students drawings. We also need an online board in order to write their opinions and upload their drawings.
We begin by asking about robots: What is a robot? Is it a tin silver box, is it a round flat object, a motor vehicle or is it a hairy dog? What can he do? Why do we build it?
All of the above are some of the questions we make to our students about robots. Our young students think and answer the above questions. The answers are written on a padlet or other whiteboard.
Next we explain what a robot is and why people build it: A robot is a mechanical device that can replace humans in various tasks. A robot can operate under the direct control of a human or autonomously under the control of a programmed computer. Robots can be used to do tasks that are either difficult or dangerous to do directly by a human. In other cases, they are used to perform tasks faster or cheaper than humans. Thus, they can be used in the automatic production of large quantities of a product and at a lower cost (for example, in production chains).
The word robot comes from the Slavic robota meaning work. It was introduced as a term in its current meaning in 1920 by the Czech playwright Karel peapek in his play "RUR" (Rossum's Universal Robots), which satirizes the dependence of society on engineers (robots) of technological development and who eventually exterminate them. their creators. In many modern Slavic languages (eg Polish) it is used as an expression of everyday life in the sense of hard work (equivalent to hamaliki). Among the first robots mentioned in literature are Talos from Greek mythology and the 20 tripod boilers of Hephaestus considered "miracle of ideas" etc. Robotics deals with the development and study of robots , a science that is a combination of many disciplines of other sciences, mainly computer science, electronics and engineering. In the science fiction are usually robots that have the form of humans. These robots are called androids . Today's robots are not androids designed to impersonate human beings. Isaac Asimov made an important contribution to the literature on robots with the three laws of robotics that he formulated in his short stories. It is important to develop robots that have the necessary characteristics to be friendly and beneficial to humans. These elements are called elements of social intelligence. Source: http://el.wikipedia.gr
After, children design- draw their robot and name it (according to their imagination). Finally, they can cut and color a 3D robot and connect its pieces. The form for the 3D robot can be found here.
How does the robot work?
How does he do what he does? But of course with the instructions we gave him (program) and we planned him to do what we want! My own robot, Talos has received clear instructions from me to put a washing machine. Here are the instructions I gave him:
- If the washing machine is not plugged in then plug it in.
- If the washing machine is plugged in, open the tub door.
- Open the laundry basket.
- Take as many light-colored clothes as you have until you reach 5 kilos of clothes or when the light-colored clothes are finished.
- Put them in the washing machine bucket.
- Pour a detergent tablet into the bin.
- Close the bucket door.
- Choose the program that says "light color".
- Select the 1000 rpm.
- Choose a temperature of 60 degrees.
- Press the start key.
- When the program ends and you hear the end sound then open the bucket door.
- Unplug the washing machine.
We ask students to think about what they like their robot to do and write down the instructions they will give it to do its job on a piece of paper.
You can play games! . Have one student to do the robot and one other to do the programmer and give the instructions.Try moving a classmate around the room, instructing him or her to write something on the board or bring you an object.
The goal is students to understand that robots follow the instructions we give to them. If these are correct then our robot will do the right thing.
Students also learn the sequense structure of a program and that all the instructions are in a specific order.