Every February, the education community comes together for one day of future-focused learning. By celebrating Digital Learning Day, educators give their students the opportunity to experience learning that’s more geared toward the future and to try something new in the classroom. There’s no wrong way to spend Digital Learning Day; any tech-based activity in the classroom is perfect for engaging students meaningful education. If you’re not sure what to try, however, we’ve got some helpful hints for how you can make DL Day 2018 the best one yet as it approaches this Thursday, Feb. 22.
Code with Robots
As of now, the most important skill students can learn for the future is coding. When robots and machines come for many of the jobs on the market, those who will outlast them will be able to do things that they are not capable of doing. They will also be proficient in computer coding. So many in the education field have realized this and begun teaching kids how to code long before they ever set foot on a college campus. We understand if you’ve been under the impression that coding is something reserved for certain students to take on only once they reach college. Well, times have changed and just about everybody is going to need to know about it for one reason or another. Thankfully, introducing students to coding early on in their lives is easy, affordable, and, honestly, pretty fun.
One of the best ways to teach students the basics of coding is by using robotics. There are tons of educational robots and kits that are designed for this very purpose. Some come fully assembled and ready to code right out of the box while others require students to build them as they also learn engineering skills at the same time. For starter-level students, coding with robots can take place as soon as first grade. You may have heard of the Dash and Dot Robots, Ozobot, or meeperBOT. All of these (plus plenty of others) are great for getting started. The meeperBOT is very simple with age-appropriate, app-controlled driving while the Ozobot makes use of line-tracking technology to teach kids about color coding and the Dash and Dot utilize block-based programming to get kids comfortable with the Blockly language.
Getting the chance to learn coding with robots like those is great for a student’s development. And, the beauty of learning coding is that it’s truly a progressive skill, meaning that learning one aspect of it sets kids up for learning the next aspect. Just like there are robotics tools for teaching young students coding, there are some for intermediate and older students. In middle school, kids can use the mBot to take graphical programming to the next level or the Meccano Meccanoid to build and program something much more complex. Once they reach high school, they’ll be ready to take on the most advanced robotics tools like the humanoid NAO Robot or XYZrobot. Because of the coding skills they’ve already learned, which we hope as many students as possible can experience on Digital Learning Day, they’ll be much better positioned to know about and further explore coding through robotics.
Solve a Tactile Puzzle
Puzzles aren’t bad for helping children think one step ahead and solve problems on a bit of a smaller scale. They’re even better when they’re both tactile and digital. The Puzzlets playset from Digital Dream Labs is a fantastic way for kids as young as six years old to build some digital skills while also exercising their brains. This tool is a way for teachers to turn game-based learning up an extra notch by giving kids something they can truly get excited about. Plus, it helps unlock skills they can actually use in the real world, like creativity, trial and error, and even collaboration. By the time they’ve completed a few Puzzlets levels, students tend to be better versed in both technology and problem solving. That’s due, in large part, to the addition of the tactile element of Puzzlets to complement its technological usefulness.
The easy-to-use, fun-to-play Puzzlets are able to provide students with a meaningful first foray into both computational thinking and logical reasoning as well—without them even knowing that they’re learning! With a focus on 21st century skills, the Puzzlets kits help activate the whole brain by engaging kids with challenging puzzles they’ll have a blast solving. The three different Puzzlets apps (with one game currently available and two more in the works) are designed with future-focused learning in mind, allowing kids as young as five to learn at their own pace without even realizing they’re developing programming skills. The beauty of Puzzlets really stems from its ability to take what seems like playtime and turn it into experiences that are useful for 21st century students. Though they are years away from applying these digital skills in the workforce, Puzzlets can play a pivotal role in shaping foundational skills from a very young age!
Puzzlets includes a Bluetooth-enabled, USB-compatible Play Tray that’s built specifically to be easy to operate and readily accessible for young children. The Puzzlets tiles are all under an ounce in weight and about an inch square, making them effortless for small children to handle and place correctly. The included educational game is also both engaging and subtle, designed to let children learn at the pace that’s best for them with technology that’s not too difficult for them to understand. Puzzlets also features a rechargeable battery that is built for up to seven hours of continuous gameplay before it needs recharging and it can easily hold a charge for up to three months depending on usage. Device-wise, Puzzlets works great with iOS devices as its family of apps is designed to optimize the learning experience by incorporating a tablet screen. To grab a Puzzlets set of your own, visit the Eduporium store!
Build a Computer
Build a computer? But, only highly trained computer scientists are able to do that! Well, this may have been the case in the past, but it’s not so true anymore. Thanks to the Kano Computer Kit, kids can learn a bit about what it takes to design and build a functioning computer. Although much smaller and a lot less powerful than the computer systems they’re used to using, Kano mirrors the steps it takes to build a computer while using a lot of the same components. Once they’ve got it build, students can use it to do a number of STEM-related activities and even play games! Kano combines two of today’s most important STEM skills in engineering and coding into one great hands-on way to spend Digital Learning Day and, honestly, it’s great to keep around in the classroom all year long!
The Kano is an all-in-one kit that combines the power of Raspberry Pi with the simplicity of LEGO and comes with all the parts kids need to build their very own computer from scratch! Its award-winning design facilitates independent learning as kids aged six and up are able to teach themselves to start coding in the easiest way possible. All they need to do is follow the amazingly easy and insanely detailed instruction booklet to put it all together and connect it to a TV or computer screen to start learning. Thanks to over 10,000 hours spent with educators, parents, artists, and kids, the Kano guidebook was perfectly developed to speak directly and clearly to children. Once students collaborate to get the Kano put together, they’re then able to complete up to 1,000 different projects and learn to code games like Minecraft, Snake, and Pong! Kano really is perfect for engaging students in a unique way and helping them learn real-world skills while they think they’re playing!
All of Kano’s unique apps, games, and its operating system are designed to catalyze learning with a 21st century purpose. Each component is simple, powerful, and kid-crafted—they connect everything themselves and end up with a legitimate computer. The Raspberry Pi is the brain that gives the Kano power and allows it to operate effectively and the Raspberry Pi 3 that comes in the kit makes this DIY PC up to 50 percent faster. Its system-on-a-chip idea powers the computer with an ARM 700MHz CPU and 512MB RAM, plus the Kano OS comes preloaded on the kit’s SD card. And the keyboard? It’s wireless and Bluetooth-enabled! From the HDMI cable to the power cord, all the pieces are extremely intuitive and lead kids on a creative quest of construction! Kano comes with a charger, Raspberry Pi 3, DIY speaker, keyboard, SD card, HDMI cable, power cable, and a Wi-Fi dongle, ensuring all students need to do is pop open the box, flip open the guidebook and start on their way to engineering excellence!
Build a Video Game
If you were turned off at the idea of spending Digital Learning Day building a video game, let us explain. Do you know how video games are made? There is not a whole lot of play involved, to be honest. In fact, there’s hardly any. Video game developers have to be very fluent in a number of different codinglanguages in order to create the functionality and the graphics for the games kids love to play. Perhaps the best part is that game developers can make a lot of money these days. The economy that’s so much focused on STEM work also includes this area and new jobs continue being created every year. Now, with the emergence of virtual reality gaming, having development skills is a step in the right direction towards a legitimate STEM career.
With the Bloxels video game builder kit, kids can get started with these experiences right now. Bloxels has revolutionized STEM education by leveraging fun-filled technology to help empower kids to do something they could have previously only dreamed about—create their own video games in a totally realistic and easy way! No longer is coding too complex of a challenge for kindergarten-aged kids and no longer are video games simply a distraction. With Bloxels, kids get to observe and understand what it’s like to create video games by using specialized Bloxels blocks to create the environment for a specific scene in an actual game. All they have to do is construct the layout of the game, add in their own art, and then build and animate their own character—all of which are ideal for bolstering an acumen for complex design and interactive coding skills! Kids as young as five years old can use Bloxels to create genuine video games and lay a foundation for a future filled with innovating their way through design challenges!
Bloxels is a collaborative sandbox app that uses physical gaming pieces to help kids create digital video game environments. Students construct the layout of their game’s scene—everything from the sky, grass, and other objects for their characters to navigate—on the Bloxels board, snap a picture using the Bloxels Builder app, and upload it into an actual game to fill the blank space left for them to create! The technology involved is actually very simple as Bloxels utilizes a completely hands-on system for helping kids create 13X13 pixel art with their game board. The art kids generate on the game board is then captured and instantly digitized as they take a picture with their device’s camera! The Bloxels Builder app is available for download on Apple, Android, and Kindle—and it will help kids of all ages build increasingly important tech skills they can use to create, code, and innovate their way to future readiness! Though Bloxels is a pretty awesome learning tool, it’s not all fun and games as it helps serve an incredible relevant purpose.
Design and Engineer with a 3D Printer
These days, 3D printing is a huge part of STEM education. Some people tend to think, however, that it just provides students with the chance to use a large machine to create a small object. In reality, however, there’s a lot more to it than that. Since it is going to be Digital Learning Day after all, we’re going to focus on 3D printing’s potential for just that—digital learning. In order to print an object in three dimensions, students first have to create the design they want to print. To do this, they need digital fabrication software and a computer or laptop. Most of the time, 3D printers come complete with their own software, so students just have to install in on their computers and they’re able to get it up and running very quickly. Some even allow them to start printing right away! With this software, students can easily create designs to their exact specifications and get a feel for what it’s like to use this highly customizable technology to create physical objects to satisfy a number of needs.
Like other STEM tools, there are various kinds of 3D printers that students can use at any age and with any skill sets. We’d recommend the earliest kids are exposed to 3D printing is around their third grade year. To get started with 3D printing, the XYZprinting company offers a great and affordable solution for younger students. The XYZ MiniMaker is a legitimate 3D printer that pretty much looks like a Fisher Price toy. Students, however, can get the same experiences they would with a traditional 3D printer in a way that’s appropriate for them. At only $249.95, the MiniMaker is lightweight, portable, and easy for beginner students to use. This desktop option includes much of the same technology as more powerful printers, but on a smaller scale, making it a reasonable option for an early elementary classroom.
We have a bunch of other 3D printing options on our store as well, any one of which would be perfect for Digital Learning Day. Even if you can’t get a printer into your school in time for this year’s DL Day, there’s no harm in getting started a couple of days late or getting a leg up on preparation for next year. We believe that every day should be Digital Learning Day and strive to provide teachers with whatever EdTech tools they need to make this a reality. If you don’t think 3D printing is right for you or your students, we hope you’ll check out our website to learn more about the hundreds of STEM tools you could be using to provide kids with a top-notch 21st century education. We hope everybody has a great Digital Learning Day and encourage you to share your classroom experiences with us on Twitter!
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