I wish this event could be used to study how kids learn.

http://www.hak4kidz.com

I taught Python and felt I made good use of the 8 hours, will make better use of the 8 hours next time, and continue this pattern.  Except it pains me that I am the one trying to understand how people learn, and I suspect someone who had a proper foundation would both improve the 8 hours more than me, and also take away some observations that I would hope could improve general teaching techniques.

What I can say: having visual results engaged them.   being able to create graphic images that would be next to impossible by hand, even with hours of tedious effort, and a few loops and math and something beautiful appears almost instantly, that grabs their attention.







On Mon, Oct 2, 2017 at 3:35 AM, kirby urner <kirby.urner@gmail.com> wrote:

Given I'm spending 3-4 days a week with 5th & 6th graders, teaching them Python, I'm looking for ways to sync with what Common Core says they should be learning math-wise.

They general strategy here is to look for topics already in the curriculum and develop coding skills around those topics.

Turns out that prime versus composite is important at that age, and the classic algorithm used to teach that is the Sieve of Eratosthenes.  Most coders have written at least one of those.

Since we're transitioning from block-based MIT Scratch with not much keyboarding, to full-fledged lexical Python, I'm thinking to assess facility with keyboarding (typing) by having them hand-enter a Sieve, and running it to check for any syntax errors.

While we're still doing natural and whole numbers it makes sense to look at other number series as well, ones we can explore using very simple Python. 

Triangular and square numbers, then polyhedral number sequences, such as successive shells around a nucleus. 1, 12, 42, 92...

http://oeis.org/A005901  (note link to my website under links)

Pascal's Triangle is an important hub for studying number sequences.  It even embeds the Fibonacci Numbers.

These are the kinds of ideas I've been circling for some years. 

What's new is I'm getting more opportunities to test them in real world classrooms. Coding with Kids is keeping me busy.

With my adult students, I'm looking at what I call the "Five Dimensions of Python" wherein they expand their awareness of the language, from keywords (dimension 0) to 3rd party ecosystem (dimension 4).

(links to another Jupyter Notebook)

I've finally figured out that Codesters (codesters.com) is about Python 2.7, not Python 3.x.  I've been confused on that score.

Given cryptography is playing a more important role in everyday eCommerce, it makes sense to beef up some of the Number and Group Theory aspects of K-12.

I've been arguing on math-teach that right when we introduce primes versus composites, we should likewise introduce Fermat's primality test.


Kirby


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