Week 1

The simple circuits activity is an activity that I believe can be used with a wide age group of students. One of the learning goals for this activity would be: Students will be able to identify and understand the roles of energy sources (battery), conductors (wire), and loads (light bulb) in a circuit. This would be a student centered activity. Students would have the opportunity for hands-on learning about the closed path necessary for electricity to flow. Once students have the opportunity to explore what makes the electricity flow to the bulb they would have a chance to design and build a vehicle from recycled materials while implementing a simple circuit into their design. 

I think that the lesson where students are creating the vehicle from recycled materials and incorporating a simple circuit into their design would be classified as digital fabrication with kids. I would consider it fabrication with kids because the students are doing all the hands on work and would be building it for themselves using resources that they learned. This is fabrication with kids because I am not the one that is creating the actual item for the students to use in the lesson. 

One of the challenges of using electronics in the space I am teaching is the students' abilities to use them. From what I know of these students they have no prior experience with circuits.  Since the students I am working with range in age from 5-7 I think that it might be a challenge to get all the students on board with the activity and I feel that the frustration levels of some students might be reached at an early point in the lesson.  To support my students in learning this content I will provide them with a lesson on how electricity flows with step by step instructions.  I will allow them to explore the circuits on their own and earn badges as they go through the circuits. As they earn their badges the complexity in the circuit will increase. This allows the students to build on their knowledge as they go. 

In my experiences that I have using project based learning I found that my students were far more involved with the lessons and were excited to come up with their own solution to the problems. One of the main challenges that I faced is the time constraints. In the classroom there is only so much time to get things done and a project that is more hands-on requires a lot of time.  It also takes quite a bit of time to prepare  for the entire  project. One way that I think I could adjust for the time constraints is by setting aside time blocks each day for the project. I think that