lance pedersen bio: i am a relatively new teacher who has had to rapidly adjust to teaching in the...

Lance PedersenBio:

I am a relatively new teacher who has had to rapidly adjust to teaching in the CTS area. I started my career three years ago at Ross Sheppard High School where I taught a variety of courses including Legal Studies, Robotics, Math, Physics, Social Studies and General Sciences. Last year was my first

experience teaching Computer Science and with no background it was a very steep learning curve. I am now at Jasper Place High School teaching CS from the introductory to the advanced AP level - talk about diving into the deep

end!

Session Topics–Computer Science –Raptor and transitionIf time:–Useful tips and tricks–List of sites and my email if you

would like a list of these sites

Computer Science –Changes to curriculum–University recognition as Science–Community for support – Joe Clark CTS

and Iverson mailing list–Iverson exam

Raptor

• Flowcharting/planning tool• Much easier for teaching the concepts of

planning rather than focusing on their drawing/MSWord

• Created by Martin Carlisle• Small and easy on the system so older

machines can run the program• FREE!

How it works for me• Begin with scratch which was demoed by Scott

Couprie last session – Also free and very powerful tool to hook, teach and retain students with.

• Guided exploration• Transition to Discussion about IPO – reference

humans and bring in scratch projects• Introduce raptor• Start the basic calculator problem and let them

finish.

Robot Fire Escape

• Problem Specifics, Field trip, Partner work• 2 levels of completion – standard and efficiency (involves counter variable)– templates to scaffold

• Student Examples• 2-3 day project depending on class -- This

semester was the first time every student finished the efficiency version within the time limit

Transition

• Intro C++ language basics (2 weeks to get to control structures)

• Use Raptor to plan as needed.• They program the same basic calculator project

in C++ (good scaffold for 20)• Hit generate C++ in Raptor • Compare and contrast the two codes. Not great

for more advanced projects but awesome for intro control structures

Where do you go from here?

• Up to you but some tips I’ve found helpful• Journaling with NetVibes and Ted Videos• Diigo toolbar to highlight webpages – don’t

reinvent the wheel. Have a list of good tutorial sites for students and when you go through them just highlight the page directly and tell them to as well. They can easily access from anywhere with Diigo account.