Lesson 1: Course Overview¶
| Authors: | Paul Xu, Marcus Penny |
|---|---|
| Date: | Jan 25, 2018 |
| Time: | 1 hour |
Lesson Information¶
This lesson is an overview of the structure of the course. It takes the form of student-led discussions and gives the students opportunities to write down and talk about their existing understanding of coding and coders. The goal of this lesson is to set up correct expectations of the course, including what the students will have learned by the end of the course, what is to expect from the course, and when and how to seek support.
The purpose of the lesson is to:¶
- Overview the goal and logistics of the course
- Walk students through the hardware and software systems that they will use in the course
- Explain what Internet of Things (IoT) is and introduce final project
- Establish expectations for the course
Driving Questions:¶
- What is coding?
- What are the qualities of a good coder?
- What is the Internet of Things (IoT)?
Computer Science Concepts:¶
Coding, Internet of Things (IoT)
Materials Needed¶
Blank sheets and marker pens for each group of students. A video clip on IoT (supplied in this lesson plan). Projects from previous students.
Target Skills¶
Students will be able to
- SWBAT talk about what coding is and what computer programs do
- SWBAT articulate what is to expect when they are coding and what qualities are required to become good coders
- SWBAT know the names of Raspberry Pi, ESP boards, and sensors (not specific ones).
Instructional Plan and Structure¶
Overview of the lesson (5 minutes)¶
Welcome the students to the course and explain to the students that this is not just a coding class, but a class on computational thinking.
Do Now! Group Discussion (30 minutes)¶
Pair students up (temporarily or for the rest of the course), and have the students discuss the following questions. Make sure the students understand that these are open-ended questions and there are no right or wrong answers. Our goal is to understand what they think of coding and computational thinking. They can write down their answers on the blank sheets provided to them.
- What is coding?
- What do computer programs do?
- What makes a good coder/programmer?
- What is computational thinking?
Explain to the students that we will be answering these questions throughout the course. We will revisit these questions at the end of the course and see if their ideas will change. When discussing Question 3, highlight the idea that the most important quality of a good coder is not intelligence, but resiliency. Codes don’t work 99% of the time, and it is important that they don’t give up.
Overview of Final Project (15 minutes)¶
Ask if the students have heard of “The Internet of Things (IoT).” The following video does a good job in explaining what IoT is:
After finishing this video, replay the video and ask the students write down some of the IoT applications/ideas demonstrated in this video. Discuss these ideas as a class.
Introduce to the students that the final project of the course is building an IoT application. They can design what they want to do with the project. It could be something very similar to what is introduced in the video or an idea of their own. The minimum requirement is one sensor and two devices that talk to each other.
Demonstrate to the students that they will be programming with a Raspberry Pi and an ESP board. Show the students what the students have done in the past.
Review and Assessment¶
An exit slip (or Google classroom) with the following questions:
- What makes a good coder?
- What is the Internet of Things?