Day 1
01 Welcome 02 Model Lesson 03 Model Lesson Reflection 04 Wrap Up
Day 2
05 Welcome 06 Summary of Curriculum Investigation 07 Assessment 08 Scenarios 09 Wrap Up

Session 2: Model Lesson (U3L7)

40 minutes

lesson exploration

Purpose

This model lesson is intended to model pedagogy. The facilitator will model best practices within a model lesson while demonstrating the collaborative classroom culture CS Discoveries is trying to create. A virtual lesson will be different from an in-person lesson, however, many of the practices that a teacher would normally include in an in-person lesson can be modified to work within the constraints of a virtual setting.

Objectives

  • Identify when and how to implement various teaching strategies
  • Develop empathy for the student experience in a new programming lesson
  • Create a sprite in Game Lab

Supplies & Prep

Workshop Modality:

  • Whole group
  • Individual
  • Breakout rooms

Facilitator Supplies:

Teacher Supplies:

  • Computer with webcam
  • Video conferencing software
  • Paper and writing utensil

Agenda

Warm Up (5 minutes)

Activity (30 minutes)

Wrap Up (5 minutes)

Facilitation Guide

Warm Up (5 minutes)

Producer Instructions: Prepare breakout rooms with three to four participants in each room.

Remarks

We are about to engage in a model lesson. During this time you will be wearing a learner hat and I will be wearing a teacher hat. Because of time, we will only do a portion of the activity, and the lesson will be modified slightly to fit our virtual context. We will, however, still start the lesson with a warm up and end with a wrap up. Put your learner hats on and let’s get ready to go!

How Much Information?

Review: So far we've only written programs that put simple shapes on the screen. List all of the different pieces of information that you have used to control how these shapes are drawn.

Prompt: If you wanted to create programs with more detailed images, maybe even characters that you could interact with, what other pieces of information might you need in your code?

Discussion Goal

The goal here is to get learners thinking about all of the different values that go into drawing a single shape on the screen, and how many more values they may need to control a more detailed character in a program. If learners are struggling to come up with ideas, you might use some of the following prompts: How do you tell a shape where to go on the screen? How do you tell a shape what size it needs to be? How do you tell a shape what color it should be? What about its outline? What if you wanted to change any of those values during your program, or control other things like rotation?

Share: Allow learners to share out their lists using a quick popcorn style share out

Remarks

Today we'll learn how to create characters in our animations called sprites. These sprites will help us keep track of all the information that we need in our programs.

Question of the Day: How can we use sprites to help us keep track of lots of information in our programs?

Activity (30 minutes)

(2 minutes) Exploration

  • Learners navigate to Unit 3 Lesson 7 Level 1 in Code Studio

  • Learners are given the opportunity to explore Level 1.

(5 minutes) Video and Discussion

Video: Show the video introducing sprites as a whole group. (2:37)

Important Note: If the facilitator is showing the video to the group, make sure to also share audio. Alternatively, each participant can mute their audio and watch the video individually. Either way, the group should come together to discuss the video before moving on to the other activities in the level progression.

Discussion Goal

Sprites are a very complex concept, and learners may have difficulty understanding exactly what they are. The most important aspect for learners to understand is that sprites allow them to organize a lot of information about something that they want to draw to the screen.

Facilitator Tip

This exercise serves as a quick formative assessment. The teacher is able to get a quick pulse on the general understanding within the room and clarify misconceptions in real time. (Role of the Teacher: ongoing assessment of student understanding)

Discussion:

  • Have participants navigate to the “What do we know about sprites?” slide in the shared slide deck
  • Ask the group, “What do we know about sprites so far?”
  • Add to the slide as learners share out

(13 minutes) Breakout Rooms - Level Progression

Transition to Breakout Rooms: Allow learners to continue within the level progression in breakout rooms of three to four participants. While in the breakout rooms, one participant should screenshare to allow the group to work through the activities together.

It is likely that learners will not finish the level progression within the time allotted. The goal is for learners to get to Level 7 if possible.

Producer Instructions: Send participants to breakout rooms with three to four participants in each room for 12 minutes. Give a two minute warning before bringing the group back together.

Facilitator Tip

Make sure to model the role of the teacher within this plugged lesson:

  • Ongoing formative assessment
  • Direct students to reference resources
  • Gather and share class feedback
  • Guide students through the debugging process
    • Celebrate bugs!
    • Don’t debug for the learner

While learners are working through the level progression, facilitators should be circulating the breakout rooms to check for understanding and gather class trends for misconceptions, strengths, or areas of improvement (focus on what learners are doing well). Ask learners to talk through their code with you. Check to ensure that learners know why they sequenced their code the way they did.

Wrap Up (5 minutes)

(1 minute) Review Key Vocabulary

  • Sprite- A character on the screen with properties that describe its location, movement, and look.
  • Property - A label for a characteristic of a sprite, such as its location and appearance.
  • Dot Notation - the way that sprites' properties are used in Game Lab, by connecting the sprite and property with a dot.

(1 minute) Journal

Prompt: So far we've been able to change a sprite's location and image. What else might you want to change about your sprites?

(3 minutes) Share

Discussion Goal

This discussion prompts learners to think about the different properties that a sprite might have, and prepares them for the next lesson, which explicitly covers sprite properties.

Allow learners to share out their lists using a quick popcorn style share out. While participants are sharing, try to highlight ideas that relate back to the question of the day.

Question of the Day: How can we use sprites to help us keep track of lots of information in our programs?