WHERE DO YOU TEACH? WHAT SORT OF SCHOOL IS IT?
I teach Technology Education at Haverhill Cooperative Middle School in North Haverhill NH. It is a 4-8 Public Middle School in a rural district with around 250 students.
HOW DID YOU GET STARTED TEACHING COMPUTER SCIENCE?
My interest in Computer Science started in High School, then continued in college, and has always been some part of my life. Before being a Tech Ed teacher I was a Para Educator, and an enrichment provider with the after school program. I did an Enrichment using Lego Mindstorms, and part of the reason I was asked to apply for the Tech Ed position was the success of that program. As such, it was only natural that I add a heavy amount of Computer Science to my 4-8 curriculum.
DESCRIBE THE COMPUTER SCIENCE CURRICULUM AT YOUR SCHOOL. WHAT COURSES DO YOU HAVE AND WHAT ARE THE FOCUSES OF EACH?
I do all of the computer science here at HCMS, and am happy that 3 of the 5 grade levels I teach are heavily focused on Computer Science, and one other has a slight focus on it. My grade 4 students use Code.org pretty regularly to explore coding, my Grade 5 Students Learn Computer Science through programming Lego Mindstorms, my Grade 6 students continue their study of Lego Mindstorms, and my grade 8 students do Mobile Application Development with App Inventor 2.
WHAT IS YOUR OVERALL TEACHING PHILOSOPHY? PROJECT BASED LEARNING? FLIPPED CLASSROOM? IN SHORT, WHAT MAKES YOUR CS PROGRAM “YOUR CS PROGRAM?”
My program is project based, flipped, and focused on learning by exploration. Typically, I give my students some manner of design challenge, and guide them towards where they can find answers to solve the problem I present. Certainly some items, especially at first need to be given directly, but I find students are more engaged if they need to work for the answers they want. I am also developing some short videos on the basics of Lego Mindstorms Ev3 programming that my students will be able to use as refreshers when they get stuck.
WHAT IS THE BIGGEST CHALLENGE IN TEACHING CS AT YOUR SCHOOL?
The biggest challenge with trying to teach any subject other than Math or English is time. Each year the amount of time I have with my students has been reduced, or changed in a way that makes it difficult to have a rigorous program.
WHAT IS ADMINISTRATION’S SUPPORT (OR LACK OF SUPPORT) LIKE AT YOUR SCHOOL?
At my school the administration give lip service support to our STEM efforts, but continues to reduce class time for STEM.
HOW DO YOU MEASURE SUCCESS FOR YOUR PROGRAM? FOR YOUR STUDENTS?
I consider my program successful when I see my students engaged in learning. I consider my students successful, when their ability to problem solve increases. I certainly believe that the technology I am using to teach my students is important, as is gaining some level of mastery over that technology. The true measure of my SUCCESS as a teacher however, is my students ability to creatively solve problems in any situation, NOT just in my classroom.
WHAT IS THE ONE THING YOU LIKE TO TALK ABOUT REGARDING YOUR PROGRAM THAT I HAVEN’T ALREADY ASKED?
How do you effectively teach students? By figuring out how they learn.
TELL ME ABOUT YOUR ONLINE PRESENCE (IF ANY)
- School name and web site: Haverhill Cooperative Middle School http://hcms.sau23.org/
- Twitter: @kleenur
- Blog: www.SuperStarStem.com
- Facebook is SuperstarStem Blog
Note: The index for this interview series is at http://blog.acthompson.net/2017/10/computer-science-educator-interview.html and is updated as new interviews are posted.
No comments:
Post a Comment