Hi guys!  This week’s post is going to give you an insight into what we were doing in today’s Digital Technologies class.  This week was really good fun and was one of those opportunities, rarely seen in other subjects, where our imaginations were able to run wild and we could spend the whole 4 hours constructing our creations.  This week we were working with Bee-Bot and our task was to create an educational game that could be used in a classroom.  My group chose to base our game around a book called ‘Small Bear Lost’ which was the story of a small bear who was left on a train and struggled to find his way home.  The first thing he did was finish his journey on the train and get off at the next train station which we called ‘Paddington Station’.  He then walked to a bus stop and got on a bus which took him to the entrance of a park where he found some balloons and floated away.  He eventually got stuck on a gate which burst the balloons, luckily, he was right across the street from where is house was.  Our game had a train track/tunnel that the renamed Bear-Bot had to navigate through from ‘Bearverly Station’ to ‘Paddington station’, then he had to navigate his way to the bus stop and onto the bus.  Then he travelled to the park where he floated off and was eventually stopped by a gate that was right across the street from his house.  The aim of the game was for the children to decide which area of the map the bear had to go to next by going over the facts they remembered from reading the story in class.  For example, when the bear got off the train where did he go next?  Did he go to the park or to the bus stop?  The children had to decide which area the bear went to and navigate the Bear-Bot around the map and to the correct area.  To make the navigation part a little more complicated than going in straight lines we used 3D objects to create barriers that the children had to go around.

I think that these kinds of activities are really useful in the classroom as it is not just getting the children to advance their technological skills but the cross curricular aspect of it means that they are learning two things in one activity.  This, in theory, should make your life and their lives a little more fun and interesting, not to mention easier for you too!

The Professional Development Service for Teachers (PDST) says that programmable toys allow pupils to learn about control and directional language through play while learning about a variety of different subjects.  In their paper ‘Floor Robots – focus on literacy and numeracy (Primary)’ they have four benefits of using floor robots in the classroom.

1. They provide a vehicle for the introduction of key concepts in an easy and friendly way.
2. They help with the development of skills such as logical sequencing, measuring, comparing lengths, space orientation and expressing concepts in words.
3. They encourage group interaction, conversation and collaboration.
4. They are visually very appealing to young pupils, with clear, bright buttons and a robust design.

The paper also gives you a couple of examples for a literacy and a numeracy activity, you can have a look for yourself at the link below.

http://www.pdsttechnologyineducation.ie/en/Training/ICT-in-Classroom-PDFs/ICT-in-the-Classroom-PDFs/Floor-Robots-focus-on-literacy-and-numeracy-Primary-13-06.pdf

Until the next time

Chloe x