I wanted to share an idea I had for Unit 1 of CSD.
There are a lot of activities having students create posters of their ideas. This can get cumbersome when you have multiple classes (middle school), not to mention expensive. Unit 1.4 also requires a lot of printing. So . . . instead of having students create posters and have to print and cut multiple copies of the pictures, I employed my bulletin boards. I put “Computer” and “Not a Computer” signs on each board and had students pin their pictures on them. I was able to get away with printing and cutting out only ONE set of the pictures for all classes. Also, the fact that they were merely pinned and not pasted allowed me to have students move their pictures after we learned the official definition of a computer. Very handy! CSD Unit 1 is working out great!!
Great idea! All my classes are paperless and the idea of cutting out the pictures and wasting ink bothered me too. I decided to take the pictures given and upload them to schoology.com. I then had the students download the pics and create a Publisher document with “Computer” and “Not a Computer” Columns and had them sort their pics that way then they turned in their boards and I showed them on the TV what each group came up with. All of my students going through this class had me last year and knew how to use Publisher.
Great ideas! I’ve created this in Google Draw and give the students the “view only” so they can make a copy and organize for themselves or with a partner. Great ways of modifying for your classroom!
Thank you for posting this Google Draw alternative! I had this idea as well, but am THRILLED to find that the work has been done for me. THANK YOU! Will be using on Wednesday!
I have multiple class as well and had the first class do the cutting and pasting and then used the posters over and over with the other classes. We used a large post it and then glued the pictures on small post it so they could be moved around.
Thank you for sharing this idea. I was hoping to have my students create a google poster and planned on scanning the pictures. You saved me some precious time! Thanks again!
Since I have 3 classes a day for CS1 I was running into the same issue of wasting paper. I laminated 8 sheets of construction paper with the left side labeled computer and right, not a computer. Then had the groups take the laminated pictures and place them on the paper and take a picture of their finished sorting with their camera to share with me, since they want to use their phones anyway. The after discussing how and why they catagorized them as they did and showing the video again about what makes a computer, I had them resort and take a second picture. Taking the picture wasn’t really necessary for understanding, but it made it a bit more fun for them.
I actually used this similar technique but improvised it to use it for grade 7’s with Photoshop task.
Students were able to easily create an A3 size poster with input/output devices and give one line description of each of these devices.
Here is my version of this activity. Digital CSD - 1.4 What is a Computer? Very little setup time and you can pair or group assign. I post this in Google Classroom. If you use edmodo or Schoology you can easily share the link for your students.
That’s great! I would just warn against the straight down the middle division of “Computer and Not a Computer” because this lesson should create a lot of conversation on what is and isn’t, and from the example shared above, a majority of the items can be claimed “are computers”.
I couldn’t agree with this more. Ironically, all my groups seemed to agree that a stoplight WAS a computer, which is funny because MY generation may not have agreed.
P.S. Brad - I think this summer you were the ONLY other person in the giant conference room who knew who Jamiroquai is (besides being my favorite group of all-time!)
