CS FIRST - Not just Science and Mathematics


     We usually associate coding with science or mathematics.  Google's CS First program offers a number of great opportunities to integrate coding across the curriculum.  It can be especially meaningful in the area of literacy, where the idea of Coding as Literacy is now a very relevant topic: "The Coding as Literacy project explores in which ways the process of teaching coding to young children can resemble the educational process used for teaching literacy and a second language and seeks to identify the overlapping associated cognitive and cultural mechanisms."  This is from:   https://sites.tufts.edu/devtech/research/coding-as-literacy/
     Google CS First is a free program, provided by Google.  It's Scratch based and provides a number of tutorials, lesson plans, projects, and resource materials for educators.  It is an online program and involves many of the record-keeping resources associated with other Google projects, but you can also access most of the curriculum for free, without participating in the program.  Here's a link to the website where you can take a look at the materials and curriculum:   https://csfirst.withgoogle.com/s/en/home.  And, here's a short youtube video that provides a quick intro to CS First: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vRvqE62zmy8
     To get an idea of what a CS First lesson might look like, go to this page which deals with the literacy topic of characterization.  There are videos for activities (step by step instruction), example Scratch programs that introduce/teach concepts associated with characterization, and downloadable lesson plans and other materials: https://csfirst.withgoogle.com/c/cs-first/en/characterization/overview.html
     A nice feature of the example programs - they open in Scratch so you can play the example and then click the See Inside button to see the code.  Here's one of the example programs from the Coding as Literacy section.  It's theme is dialogue:


     In this example the author has created an underwater scene with two characters, a jellyfish and a squid.  The jellyfish sprite is highlighted now so you see its code.  It's pretty simple, just a combination of several Say commands (these create a text balloon) and Wait commands.
 


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