Through a unique partnership between ESD 112 and WSU Vancouver, aspiring teachers see how technology can inspire learning and make it fun.
“This is a really fun Monday because you can play with robots,” Katherine Livick told a class of education majors at WSU Vancouver. Livick, an integrated learning coach at Educational Service District 112, was on campus with fellow coach Katrina Wambold to teach aspiring teachers how to use computational thinking and computer science in the classroom.
“We’re giving you a lot of tinker time, because we want you to experience a little bit of what your students will experience,” Livick said, adding that tinker time is “a marriage of play and inquiry.” While students get deeply absorbed in figuring out how to control the little robots, they are also solving the problems they encounter.
Offered in fall 2018, the class was designed for students embarking on the path toward teacher certification. Washington state introduced new technology standards for teachers in 2018. Announcing the new standards, Washington’s Superintendent of Public Instruction Chris Reykdal noted that today’s students are “digital natives” who need to be prepared to thrive in the ever-growing technology-powered world.
WSU Vancouver’s semester-long class aims to meet that need. It incorporates two formerly separate courses: Fundamentals of Instruction and Methods of Technology Integration. Sharon Kruse, academic director and professor of education, said the College of Education decided to experiment with combining the two classes because “we wanted our students to think about technology tools as a way to enhance student learning. And we wanted students to start thinking about technology in sophisticated instructional ways.”
In a unique partnership with WSU Vancouver, two experts in educational technologies—Livick and Wambold—came from ESD 112 for three weeks to teach the module on computational thinking, using robots as one of their key tools. Robots are not just the humanoid creatures we typically think of. They are merely simple computers that can “sense the environment, make a plan to act on it, and then act on the plan. The plan is the program we put into it, so we can control it, but if we do it wrong, they will act wrong or not at all,” Livick said. The robots used in the class were little orbs called Ozobots.
Through basic coding learned in the class, teachers can apply the robots to most any subject, from history to language to science. For example, a science teacher could ask young students to code Ozobots as if they were rabbits on a path toward a garden to look for food, stop when they find it and eat their fill. Students would program the stops and starts, speed, direction and turns for their robot rabbits.
“We want to get students to think about content in new and different ways that engage not only the content itself but also the technology,” said Paul Karlin, adjunct faculty member who taught the class.
With technology, the earlier the better
Wambold and Livick say technology belongs in the classroom as soon as kids start school. “The research shows that the younger you can get technology into their (specifically girls’) hands, the more likely they are to want to try it later on,” Wambold said.
Livick and Wambold also lead three-day workshops with in-service teachers and support technology integration statewide. Karlin attended one of their workshops in preparation for the class at WSU Vancouver.
The WSU Vancouver students were introduced to an extensive range of technology tools, besides the robots. At the start of the semester, each student established a professional Twitter account to communicate with colleagues and peers. For example, a group of like-minded teachers using robots in the classroom might use Twitter to learn from each other. The class also covered video production, presentations, digital storybooks, desktop publishing, surveys and webpages.
“The idea is that you pick the best tool for the standard you’re trying to teach,” Kruse said, “and technology allows you a wide selection of tools.”
We all know, of course, that technology evolves rapidly. Email and instant messaging were cutting edge just 20 years ago. Given the pace of that, what’s a teacher to do?
“That’s one of the things the technology standards talk about,” Karlin said. “We want the student to be a problem solver and critical thinker—not learning a specific skill for a specific technology, but learning how to learn. We’re really trying to teach adaptability and problem solving.”
The human face of technology
The students have been using their Twitter accounts to talk about what they’re learning in the class. “We love coding,” wrote one student whose Twitter handle is Miss Ohs. She uploaded a picture showing herself holding a tiny micro:bit (basically a pocket-sized computer that can flash messages, sense motion and be hooked up to other devices).
“I ran across this today—another cool way to teach coding and account for student interest! What do you guys think?” queried student Samantha Brosnan, uploading a link to a Harry Potter coding kit.
All in all, the photos and comments throughout the semester show an unusually lively class that was deeply engaged in learning—and enjoying it. On her final day at WSU Vancouver last fall, Livick tweeted, “Today we played with #microbit. Great fun! Keep learning, y’all, and keep in touch!” ■