'15 -'16 Sending Complex Messages

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Creating complex response is interesting lesson. I don’t think that I need to spend 45 mins on it. But lets see if they can figure out. i am planning to combine it with lesson 2.

I agree with rupal - I can definitely see where I may need to combine this with lesson 2

I definitely see this as a short lesson. It is an extension of the previous lesson so depending on where you ended with that lesson you can jump right into this one.

I am thinking the focus is on sending a complex message with a binary device. I will stretch students thinking as this will lead us to encoding with binary numbers? To be continued.

This lesson took the entire class period (58 minutes). Students were really engaged. When they entered, I told them to grab their devices off the table. I noticed around 6 new students added to my class so I paired them with groups from Day 2 lesson. I prompted students to inform new students about their message sending device and to describe their protocol to send the binary messages. Students spent a few minutes discussing and were completely engaged. I then used the lesson plan introduction to guide students thinking to send multiple messages. A few groups altered their devices, but some immediately altered their protocols to account for multiple messages with a binary sending device. They created so many protocols using the binary states. They had awesome ideas. We then transitioned to the task for today which was to use their devices in their binary state to send four possible messages or 1000000000 possible messages. My students were super excited in their explorations and came up with very interesting responses. They discovered that their devices were limited and that they needed to change the protocols to get the message across. Students connected this encoding to language. I think it was helpful that they were able to discuss their creation with other partners and having the prompts on power point for students who needed the time to think was helpful. I had to cut the lesson short so they could complete the reflection questions after the rubric.

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This lesson is good because it builds in a logical order from the last lesson and at a difficulty curve that the students should be able to handle.

simple lesson went OK for for complex messages it was a BAD Lesson plan. I need more help to guide them through it.

Can somebody elaborate on how they had students “share their solutions”? Do I prepare a set of new questions to asnwer? Thanks :slight_smile:

Can you elaborate? I’m doing this lesson shortly.

Ok. I fixed my mistake with this lesson. Ask them to go back to original protocol of A/B. Then ask them to have multiple / complex options. My students went to different track. Watch Brooks video again specially near the end.
My students went one clap for first option, 2 for 2nd and 3 for 3rd. I ended up saying to them every clap costs you $1. Reduce the cost.

So I had the same thing happen to me with 3 and 4 claps. Then I told them that their device only has two states, one clap or two claps. So 3 claps are really 1 clap followed by two. Which meant they needed to talk about a pause and modify their protocol.

When I read the lesson, I agreed with other teachers that it would be a short lesson, maybe combined with the previous lesson in a block schedule (80 min). But after reading previous posts, I am changing my thought. The forum is great as I start school next Monday - thanks for the heads up!

Thanks. I noted that for next year. :smile:

What about : one group came up with A, B, AB, BA.
What to say about getting them to AA, BB… I told them that person doesn’t know whether they go A or you are taking a break and then going to send B. Then moved them to talk about pulse etc…

I did lesson two and lesson three a few days apart. We did a lot of modeling and discussion. I found that the extended activity was helpful for lesson three where the students had to create a manual to explain how their complex messaging sytem worked and how they felt the others were helpful in revamping theirs.

I think the students are enjoying the code.org site and being able to kind of make their way through.

I did somehow forget the way to limit the student access. I remember how to only give them access to one unit at a time but I would like the opportunity to limit their access to future lessons. Is this possible? I know we talked about it but cannot seem to remember or determine if this is possible.

My students are on this right now, but I am feeling like I may have let them off to easy on the first exercise. I was thinking that I would have them document their evolution through the various stages of these exercises, but almost feel like I need to go back and have them redo the initial exercise. Part of my trepidation has to do with the idea that I did not instill in them the idea that their system had to be robust enough to deal with ever changing rules and requirements. I guess I can do that in the coming short week after Labor Day. I will think about it some more and update the next forum. Stay Tuned…

I am on a block schedule and taught this course last semester. We just started our second semester and I am VASTLY more prepared to teach Unit 1 having been through it once.

We have 90 minute periods so I did Lessons 2 and 3 together. The kids transitioned from the simple message to the complex fairly well. I had students in groups of 2 demonstrate their simple message. Solutions ranged from turning a small flashlight on/off to raising left hand/right hand to one of two dance steps.

As a means of getting them to think about more complex messages I showed the kids slides of Morse Code and of semaphore flags. The kids were quite interested in the latter.

Hey Dale,

That’s really exciting to hear and I’d actually love to continue to hear how these lessons go the second time through. Ideas about what can be combined, what ends up being critical, etc, are always appreciated and will certainly be helpful for teachers who don’t yet have the experience of going through the unit the first time.

Thanks again for your thoughts!
GT