Foundations of Computational Thinking

Monday

Welcome to March Badgeness

Welcome to March Badgeness! You’re about to embark on a new adventure - a month-long journey of exploring coding and computational thinking in the classroom. You will receive daily emails with resources to check out and/or tasks for you to complete. These resources and tasks are also accessible at any time on our March Badgeness website. Please be sure to bookmark this site so it is easily accessible throughout our journey. At the end of each week, you’ll have the opportunity to earn a badge by completing a Google Form. After earning all four badges throughout the month, you’ll receive your Coding and Computational Thinking Champion badge! To kick things off, please introduce yourself to others participating in March Badgeness by creating a slide in our slide deck linked below. Please feel free to reach out to us at any time with questions!

Earn all five badges, and you’ll be entered into a raffle to win a Blue-Bot or Pro-Bot! 🎉 But that’s not all—just for participating, you’ll receive an exclusive 20% off coupon for a robot purchase from Terrapin as our way of saying thank you for completing our course. Get ready to bring some coding fun to your classroom! 🚀🤖

✉️ Allison Blackwell ablackwell@moric.org 

✉️ Heather Shaffer hshaffer@moric.org

Links

• Welcome Video & Introduction to Website (watch this)

• March Badgeness 2025 Website (bookmark this)

• Introduce Yourself Slides (create a slide about yourself)

• Our Code.org Class URL (bookmark this)

We are excited to share that we will be incorporating Code.org into a few upcoming activities. To streamline access, we have pre-generated accounts for each of you.

You will receive a separate email with your login credentials and instructions on how to access your account. Please keep an eye out for that email, as it will provide everything you need to get started.

This week, we are exploring why we should integrate coding into our classrooms. We're going to discuss how the foundations of computational thinking serve as essential building blocks for coding—think of it as the Lego blocks of the digital age, but without the risk of stepping on them in the middle of the night!

Incorporating coding into the classroom not only equips students with essential skills for the future but also enhances their critical thinking, creativity, collaboration, and engagement in learning. This multifaceted approach prepares students to thrive in a technology-driven society.

Why Coding is Important to Integrate in the Classroom:

1. Develops Critical Thinking Skills: Coding is like solving a mystery where the culprit is that pesky bug in your code! It hones students' critical thinking skills as they channel their inner Sherlock Holmes, breaking down problems and crafting algorithms like true detectives.

2. Fosters Creativity: Think of coding as crafting a digital masterpiece instead of just doodling on the back of a math test. Students can create their own games, apps, or websites. Who wouldn’t want to design an app that reminds them to do their chores—and then ignores it like a pro?

3. Prepares Students for the Future: In our increasingly digital world, coding skills are becoming essential. Many future careers will require some level of coding knowledge, regardless of the field. By teaching coding in the classroom, educators equip students with valuable skills that will enhance their employability.

4. Encourages Collaboration: Coding often involves teamwork, which is perfect for teaching students how to work together without resorting to a game of rock-paper-scissors to settle disagreements. Plus, nothing brings friends closer than debugging a program together—it's like group therapy but with fewer feelings and more code!

5. Enhances Engagement in Learning: Creating your own video game about chromosomes and genes is way more appealing than listening to a lecture. By incorporating coding into various subjects, educators can create engaging lessons that capture students' interests and encourage active participation.

6. Promotes Digital Literacy: In a world where asking Siri for directions is a common occurrence, understanding how coding works is crucial. It’s like giving students the keys to the digital kingdom, so they don’t just scroll through TikTok mindlessly but also understand the magic behind it!

Wednesday

In today's digital age, understanding coding is as essential as reading and writing. This article serves as an essential guide for educators looking to integrate coding into their classrooms effectively. It highlights the benefits of teaching coding, including enhancing problem-solving skills, fostering creativity, and preparing students for future careers in a tech-driven world. With practical tips, resources, and strategies, this guide equips teachers with the knowledge they need to inspire their students to become confident coders. 

Computational thinking (CT) is the heart of coding. The main foundations of CT are:

Abstraction is simplifying a complex idea or system. Students are identifying the most important parts of the system and list an order of the steps to process or even sort into categories.

Decomposition is very similar to abstraction since it involves breaking a system into its individual components.  It allows us to identify the key elements, categorize them, and organize them in a structured way.

Pattern recognition involves identifying the structures and relationships between elements within a system or data set. It plays a crucial role in recognizing causes and correlations, ultimately enabling us to predict the future behavior of a system or its components.

Testing and debugging has students checking the accuracy of their work and finding new ways to improve or fix their creation.

The foundations of computational thinking are the cognitive processes necessary to write computer programs.  These concepts are the building blocks for creating algorithms, working with data, understanding systems, and creating models for others to understand the information.

Read this article to learn how computational thinking is a valuable addition to any curriculum.

Friday

You did it! You survived week #1 of March Badgeness. Now it’s time to earn that badge!!

Reflection

This week, you’ve learned why coding is important to integrate in the classroom. You’ve also explored the foundations of computational thinking. As you reflect on what you’ve learned and your own personal experience with integrating coding into the classroom, share what has been most intriguing to you in this Google Form to earn your first badge.