So we just finished unit 2 with web design. My students did okay with it. But some were very lost with it or just weren’t very interested in it. Now we are starting unit 3 (games and animations). I have 100% engagement and all love it. Should this unit be flipped with unit 2? It just seems more intuitive to them at first.
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Whoah, this thread got lost there. Sorry for the late response as this is a really interesting question.
I’m right there with you. We started unit 3 a week or so ago and the students are really excited about it. They seems to really like it a lot better than unit 2. And I agree, I did have some burn out and students who weren’t super engaged with the website creation. CSS really helped with that.
Its be an interesting experiment to switch the two units and see how it would go.
For unit 2, making a website:
Takes typing instead of drag and drop
You have to come up with the content by typing it into an editor. Some of the content is personal. It may be hard for students to say this is me and to put that out for others to see.
The CSS comes so far after that there is no real wow factor after the initial one for the HTML.
That being said, it is interesting to see how students relate to the code in unit 3 given their past study with HTML and CSS. I think they really get the concept that things need to be spelled correctly and that there is structure in the code. Syntax and structure!. One of the goals of the class is to have students believe that code is readable and I think that HTML and CSS helps achieve that.
I also think that unit 2 prepares them to see the code in unit 3. Unit 2 helps to build their confidence so that they know that they can make something. I really see a lot confidence in students now that was not present in unit 2.
I’m also looking forward to having the students take some of their creations from unit 3 and put them into their websites that they created for unit 2. I think that they will really enjoy going back and adding a page instead of the day after day of HTML and CSS.
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Well over a year later, has anyone experimented with swapping these two units? We’re only doing this class in the spring semester, and we’re getting close to moving on to Unit 2. The class only meets twice a week, so we’ll only have time for one of Units 2 or 3. I think the students would be far more excited about creating a game than a website. Any thoughts?
Thanks!
Blair
Our district had some differences between classes when we first started implementing this curriculum. Some of the classes had unit 2 before unit 3 and some did not. Those students who experienced unit 2 before 3 had a lot easier time grasping the concepts within the code than those who had not had unit 2 first. It’s something about experiencing a predictable language like HTML that gave some depth of understanding once they got to JavaScript. That was just our experience.
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Thank you for the insight! We’ll carry on with the units as they’re designed.
I just saw this post and these comments. Last year I taught Unit 2 to my 7th and 8th graders which went well, but again some students thought it was awesome, some students struggled. I would say that my 8th graders understood Unit 2 better than my 7th graders. This next year, we’re switching from quarters to semesters and I plan on only teaching Unit 3 to 7th and 8th graders for the 2020-2021 school year, with hopes of teaching Unit 2 to the next 8th graders in 2021-2022. I will update and see how it goes with those groups this year!