On Election Day, students presented their work to their peers, admin, parents, teachers, and even the polling place supervisor working downstairs that day (since the school site happens to also be an actual polling place). The students were eloquent, knowledgeable, and visibly excited to share their hard work with an authentic audience.
What skills did students learn during their digital making experience?
- Sequencing
- Patterns
- Math in context
- Decimal fractions
- Multiples
- Abstract reasoning
- Attending to precision
- Looking for structure
- Programming concepts
- Algorithms
- ELA in context
- Punctuation
- Capitalization
- Editing & revising work
- Basic circuitry
- Electricity concepts
- Problem solving
- Perseverance & grit
- Collaboration
In addition, the hands-on learning and creating in this project-based format provided opportunities for ALL of our learners to shine! Students typically unengaged with "traditional instruction" quickly jumped into the electronics and making, while our detail-oriented friends latched on to the coding tasks, and our more artistic students enjoyed working on the sprites in Scratch and creating the persuasive videos and election posters. Students worked together, learned to solve problems as a team, and coached and supported each other throughout the process. It was amazing to see what kids are capable of when you give them a chance to work on something meaningful in the classroom.
My favorite comment during the unit-- "Ms. Haughs, I love you for teaching us this!" followed by a big hug. I guess the project was a success.
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