I have fallen in love with Google forms. I never thought of them as something you would use to conduct formative assessment until this past weekend.  We had our bi-annual CS Principles meeting, and the presenters integrated several 1 - 2 question surveys for us to complete and provide feedback. It was quick and easy!  It is Tuesday, and I have already created 5 forms for my students to fill out.  It has provided me with very quick feedback on what my students are thinking, at what stage of learning they are at, misconceptions that they have, how they are working in groups, what stage their project is in, and most importantly, what they think of my class today!  It is shaping how I present my next class and changing the way I teach.  Excellent tool.

I wanted to share the results of one of the surveys I provided to my CSP students. The survey that students participated in this morning had 2 questions.  

• What was your favorite topic, project or activity we did this year? 
  
• Why was that your favorite? 
  

I really only had 1 negative response, and I am affirmed by the number of students who's favorite topic or project involved some kind of programming. 

We just finished second semester conferences for my elementary aged children.  In the conference for my daughter Emelia, our teacher began talking about her reading level and reading comprehension.  Time and research has been spent looking at student's ability to read words and their comprehension of the text and we know that these two quantities are not always equal.  Highlighted by the kindergarten teacher's reminder to be sure that Emelia is able to retell the story afterwards, have an understanding of beginning, middle and end of the story, and to further show comprehension through inferences about why things are happening, how characters are feeling, etc. At the end of this conversation, which my husband and I have heard repeatedly as each one of our children has passed through kindergarten, the teacher remarks that she has several children who can read every word in a chapter book, but they have no comprehension of what they have read. 

Isn't this true for computer science too?  Some of our students have the ability to write code, but they have no "coding comprehension".  As I look at some of the drag and drop programs that so many are turning to as a means to incorporate more "coding" into the classroom, I wonder if we are at the same time building "coding comprehension". Are the students really understanding the code that they are writing? Can they explain it? Do they know how to alter it to make it do something new? Can they apply these structures to something new?

I'm currently helping some elementary teachers teach an after school club on coding.  We have been using the code.org curriculum, and the students love it.  It is excellent for the teachers as well, because they do not need a lot of experience in order to use the curriculum with their students.  I believe this program has been a benefit to increasing awareness for computer science, and will definitely increase the number of students taking computer science courses when they arrive in high school.  

As much as I feel this is a benefit, I am concerned that these drag and drop programs and self-guided learning may not be increasing students "coding comprehension". Looking at my own classes where I have students who take an introductory programming class, and then move on to AP, I can see the lack of comprehension from one year to the next. Students who created beautiful Alice projects, are unable to apply the concepts of loops, conditionals and arrays to Java when they get to our AP class. How can we utilize these drag and drop programs as introductory coding tools, and still build code comprehension? Without the comprehension, students are not understanding what they are writing, just like a student who has a low reading comprehension is not understanding what they are reading. 

When I enter a classroom, one of the first things I notice are posters and wall decoration.  In math classrooms, you will see instructional posters with formulas or shapes  and the order of operations.  You may also see inspirational posters about determination or cool math patterns seen in the world.  In a language arts classroom you will see posters on verbs and nouns, facts and opinions, and cause and effect.  In a foreign language classroom there are posters that labeling the classroom with the equivalent foreign language word.  These posters act as visual reminders and clue for students.  With a class that requires students to assimilate a ton of new vocabulary as well as remembering programming structure, a few posters may be helpful.  

Look for posters on computer science, and they are few and far between. Mainly I find posters on hardware or inspirational posters about careers. These are great.  But I want posters on what I'm teaching.  I want posters that show examples of lines of code.  I want specifically... Java posters. 

So, I've taken my classroom back to elementary school. Besides, we are teaching students everything they need to know about programming and many have no prior knowledge. A little like elementary school.  Walk into any elementary classroom, and there is not a bare spot on the wall. The walls are covered in clues that help students learn the new material.  My classroom is becoming much the same. I purchased large posters that resemble notebook paper and developed a basic class outline for students to follow.  I purchased some wide sentence strips that allowed me to write a single line statements such as how to create an instance of an object or to list the primitive data types. 

The feedback from my students has been very positive. They don't have to dig through their notes to find the structure of something we just learned, and over time, they stop having to look at the posters, and just know the material. I have inspirational posters in my room as well, but these instructional posters, truly let people know what we do in my room.  We aren't just playing games, or making PowerPoint presentations, we are writing programming code.

I'm a little fired up tonight.  I should be using my weekend to catch up on some chores: fold the laundry, wash the floor, make my bed.  I should be working on grading some papers. I was hoping to be able to get around to writing some curriculum that I'm working on or aligning our state IDT standards to ECS. All these are on my to do list and I had promised myself that this was going to be a productive weekend.  Well, this blog post just couldn't wait. I don't have all the answers nor have I done any real research on this topic, none the less, I hope that you chime in with your opinion. 

It all started with a quiet game of Moncala with my 5 year old daughter Emelia. We have a wooden Moncala set with real stones and sat at the kitchen table to play.  It is Saturday night, and our children have declared Saturday night game night. Great idea!  It is just Emelia and I this weekend, so we played Moncala instead of the traditional family game of Monopoly.  I usually win more than I lose when playing any games with my kids.  I don't believe in letting them win. I'll give them tips along the way, but only after they've made a bad decision. They can learn from it for next time, but I'm not playing to lose. I play to win!!! Always have. Sorry kids. Well tonight, I lost. Not once, not 1/2 the games.  I lost 5 out of 6 games to my 5 year old!!! She was strategic in her playing.  She was thoughtful.  She lost the second game to me and was determine that I wasn't going to win any more games. She was a problem solver, a mathematician. I told her as much.  I said, "You are a great strategic player and that is going to make you an excellent problem solver someday." 

I bragged on my child on Facebook, and included the fact that she is being seen as average in her class.  All satisfactory on her report card, no excellent.  I know what people are thinking. I'm just one of those Mom's who thinks my kid is great. Everyone thinks their kid deserves all E's. Someone mentioned, maybe she just doesn't apply it at school.  I don't think so.  Well, that isn't why I'm upset.  I know kindergarten grades don't mean a whole lot in the grand scheme of things, or do they?

This past week, I started recruiting for AP CS A. I utilize AP Potential which is accessed through the collegeboard.  AP Potential uses PSAT data to determine a student's likelihood of passing an AP exam.  I've used this process for many years, but this is the first time that I was so struck by the fact that out of the 158 students identified as having 70% potential of scoring a 3, 4 or 5 on the AP Computer Science A exam, only 60 of them were female. How am I supposed to build a class with a 50 / 50 ratio of girls to boys when my pool is only about 37 / 63? And what data are they using? Math and English scores. So this means that females are not only being left behind in the field of CS, but also potentially math and English. This is why I say, lack of females in CS is a symptom of a much larger problem. 

So, I wonder, where does this start? I have 3 children, 2 boys and 1 girl. I will admit that teacher conferences are dreaded at our house.  We don't want to hear again how our boys call out answers, and the long list of other behavioral grievances their teachers have, all nicely sandwiched together between glowing comments about how smart they both are.  Our boys are both in the gifted program scoring very high marks on standardized tests in both math and language arts as well as science. Our older son is in both advance math and advanced language arts. These advanced classes have helped to keep them engaged in school so that the behavior is tolerable. As parents we are grateful. As an educator, I know that the odds that I had 2 gifted kids and 1 average kid is not likely.

Teacher conferences for our daughter have been very different. Pleasant actually.  We had conferences about her in preschool and in kindergarten. We delight in the fact that she is so well liked by her peers and teachers. That she is helpful and sweet. She is dependable and often asked to help the teacher distribute papers or complete other tasks. She's a doll! We think so too, but she is also smart.  She potty trained herself at 22 months old, and was speaking in full sentences while her peers grunted and learned sign language to communicate. She taught herself to tie shoes when she didn't even have any shoes of her own to tie. She is excellent at math. She is creative and tells the most detailed and elaborate stories. And lets not forget how she just creamed in 5 games of Moncala. But her brilliance is not recognized because in comparison to her brothers, she, like most girls, is compliant. Always has been. 

Are our daughters missing out because they are too compliant? too nurturing? too mature? As an educator, we know that when students are bored, they get into trouble.  To this end boys are offered extra challenges to occupy them when they have completed tasks early. Girls are asked to pass back papers. Could this be the root of a much bigger problem? Is the message we are sending one that communicates subconsciously to girls that they are not smart enough for these challenges? 

After 15 years of teaching, I have had one of my best ideas EVER.  I thought of it last year when we were hearing more and more about the requirement of teaching soft skills in our CTE classes. I decided I would start the year by shaking the hand of every student that walked into my room, every day. How can I child feel unwelcome, unloved, uncared about, feel like you don't like them, when you give them a genuine smile, a genuine greeting and a hand shake? 

I know I'm not the first to do this with their students.  A few months after thinking I had the BEST idea EVER, I visited the middle school classroom of Mr. Rod Hames. He teaches in my cluster, and I like to visit him a couple of times a year to see what cool things he's doing. I arrived in the middle of a class, and at the bell changed, Mr. Hames went into the hall and greeted each of his students with a hand shake and a smile.  WOW! It was very powerful. Mr. Hames had an interesting take on the idea.  He said to me that he had read some where that some students go all day without any human contact. How sad is that.

So, I've come out of my own little shell.  I have pushed back the nagging thought that the students are going to think I'm strange, and I have greeted them with a handshake and a smile.  I started on registration day.  I greeted the students first, their parents second. I'm sure some parents were taken a back, as they stood there with their hands stretched out, and I reached for their child's hand first.  But you know what, right from the beginning I want my students to know that while I'm going to work with their parents, they are the bigger part of the team.  They are why I go to work every day!

When I went over my classroom norms and syllabus, there was a constant theme.  The theme that was echoed to us by our principal at the start of school.  She said we needed a giant dose of positivity.  Consequently, my supply list included (after tissues and a ream of copy paper) determination, positive attitude, creativity and a SMILE.  My norms were very much the same.  Be curtious, be respectful, do your best, be determined and have a good attitude, AND

...greet me at the door with a hand shake and a smile. 

My husband was asked to speak for Career Day at our boys’ school.  He is a software engineer, and would be fulfilling their career strand in the area of STEM. He was told that he would need to be there to present between 9 and 10:30.  WHAT? An hour and a half on Computer Programming? Surely, we will need to incorporate some activities into this presentation. Because of our testing schedule at the high school, I would be free during this time, and offered to come and help him with the activities.  Much to our relief, we found out that there would be three 20 minute presentations, but by this time, I was fully committed and we were excited about sharing Computer Programming.  Our age group was 4th graders, and we spent a week planning what we could squeeze in to our now very condensed time frame.

Every student was either dressed up, or wearing a sign stating what they wanted to do for a career. Students were dressed up as doctors, veterinarians, rock stars, police officers, and some software engineers. As students came into the room, I would ask them what they were dressed up as today.  The first student I asked said, “brain surgeon”.  My reply was, so you are going to be a computer programmer? He was understandably confused, and restated that he was going to be a brain surgeon.  But I know a brain surgeon.  One of my former programming students did an undergraduate degree in computer science and then went on to medical school to be a brain surgeon.  So, yes, brain surgeons can be computer programmers. As a matter of fact, more and more careers require the use of computer programs.  This was our primary message. You can do what it is you want to do, but you will probably need computer programming to do it better and more successfully.

After everyone had settled down, we asked students if they knew what a computer programmer was, and many of them had a pretty good idea. We followed this up with the video from code.org.  We asked students to write down on post-it notes the different careers that they saw and heard being mentioned that will require you to know computer programming. Once the video was over, we had the students share them, and stick them to the board.  It really opened their eyes as they saw programming being used in hospitals, farms, music industry, new media, recreation, etc. They really began to see that computer programming is truly for everyone.

Students developed a list of attributes that made a good computer programmer.  Their list included determination, creativity, math skills, (all 4th grade teachers loved where the code.org video stated they needed to know their multiplication tables), and collaboration. When asked what does a computer programmer look like? They said, "like my mom, my grandpa, like me".  Success!!

We wrapped up our presentation by showing a video about scratch.  Each student was given the web address where they could go and with parent permission, download scratch and become a computer programmer tonight! The students were very excited. 

Our three sessions flew by, and we left feeling that we had begun to transform the image of computer programming. We were able to empower these 4th graders to try something new, to create their own games or skits, to think creatively, and to view computer programming as something that they CAN do.  I'm looking forward to the influx of computer programming students 5 years from now.

I am glad we had the opportunity to share computer science with these young students.
Crystal Furman

Last night, we hosted our first annual Technology Fair.  With so many other departments showcasing their students' work, it just makes sense for the Business and Technology department to do the same thing. Our students are doing amazing work every year. However, we do not always allow others the privilege of sharing in their good work.  To this end, is there any wonder why people are confused about what computer science is? Or whether what we are doing in our business and technology classes is worthwhile? The latter question was answered loudly and clearly last night... YES what we are doing in computing in the modern world, computer applications, engineering, fashion marketing, video broadcasting, entrepreneurship and computer science is worthwhile... and AMAZING!

Goals
Our primary goal for last night's event was to showcase student work. I'm all about getting the most out of events though, and I wanted this to be a major public relations event; a recruitment event; and a showcase event. I wanted parents, students, and siblings to walk away feeling glad that they are in our cluster, proud to be in our classes, and eager to sign up. Mission accomplished: We had several elementary aged students exclaiming, "I love this place", "I can't wait to come here".  They were happy and engaged with several fun, and age appropriate activities. Parents were amazed with their kids, thanking us for showing them what they've been up to, and students were very proud to be there.  They loved showing their robots, projects and games to others.

Showcasing Student Work
Each teacher was given an area of our media center to display student work.  It was up to them to decide HOW the work would be presented.  Computers were utilized for student created games and websites.  We utilized display boards to showcase fashion marketing projects, and picture collages. Our Computing in the Modern World students had several Lego robots; some programmed to follow a line, others doing spin art. Students who competed in the Science Fair and the GA Tech Alice competitions received special recognition for their work. Our video broadcasting students did a compilation of their best episodes this school year and had this loop on the large screens in our media center. In engineering we had bridge demonstrations, drawings, model rockets, and mouse trap cars. Our robotics team was present with Vex robotics demonstrations.

Something for Everyone
Because recruitment is always in the back of my mind, each teacher was tasked with having an activity that was appropriate for elementary and middle aged students. The kids had a blast!


Elementary and preschool students decoding pictures.






Activities included:
~Lego Spin Art - Students created very colorful pictures using Lego robots.
~Flowchart hop-scotch - Using a coin to flip and a dice to roll, navigate through a if statement flowchart and complete the tasks along the way. So if the coin is heads the path might have them hop on one foot, but if it is tails, they would do a jumping jack. After these activities (after the if statement concluded) they might say "Howdy".
~Picture Decoding - An activity from CS Unplugged, students are given sequences of numbers to represent lengths of black and white pixels.
~Dress Your baseball player - Children created their own baseball teams uniform.
~Robotics demonstrations - Some were allowed to drive our VEX robots.
~Games - Everyone was able to tryout our games.

Next year, we plan to have a completion card for students to get a stamp for each activity, and then a prize once they've filled up their card.  We will also work with the teachers at our cluster schools to give students incentives for attending. For example, at my child's school in order to get an E in music you need to do something extra, for example they can play a piano piece for  their class, and in PE they can belong to a PE club, such as running club. So,  maybe they can get credit in an area for attending and participating in the Tech  Fair.

Ideas for Next Year
In addition to the changes to improve the involvement of younger folks, we are looking at how else we can improve our Tech Fair. One big area that we can easily improve is  planning.  The idea of a Tech Fair didn't come until a few months ago, so  we did not have a lot of time to plan and bring everything together.  With  advanced notice, we will be on our school calendar, and our teachers will be  able to begin compiling student work much earlier. Student could be asked to put  together a portfolio of their work to put on display, and this would take a lot of the preparation off the shoulders on the teachers who spent hours pulling the  projects all together.

We are also looking at the possibility of holding a cluster wide Tech Fair, to include work from our 2 middle schools and 4 elementary schools.  This would increase the awareness in our community as well as draw a lot more students to our event.

What Have You  Done?
Please share with us your experiences with your own Tech Fair, or how you have showcased your student work. We would love to hear your ideas and benefit from your successes.

Yours in
Computing!
Crystal

Recently, I sought out approval to offer 6 online review sessions for AP Computer Science students across our county.  Working in conjunction with Stephanie Arrington from Parkview HS and other AP CS teachers throughout the county, we were able to advertise these session and prepare hour long review sessions over a period of 3 weeks. We can not wait for the AP scores to come in so that we can see how these sessions have benefited students. 

The process started with a proposal that was sent to our county department chair. The proposal included the use of Blackboard collaborate to offer review on the following topic: Array, ArrayList, 2D Array; Object Oriented Programming; Recursion and Loop Tracing; GridWorld Parts 1- 3; GridWorld Part 4; and Testing Tips and Free Response.  We were granted permission to move forward. 

Advertising was handled through the classroom teacher and posted on our county Technical Education webpage.  We encouraged teachers to attend sessions with their students, because this lends an element of credibility to the sessions.  In addition, we encouraged teachers to give students an incentive for attending. Each teacher was provided with a link to a registration survey for students to complete.  Students were asked for their name, school, teacher, email and which session they would be willing to attend.  A week before the session started, students were emailed the link and reminded to attend.  Teachers also posted the information on their webpages. As students began to register, I encouraged school rivalry, by sending emails out thanking those teachers who have gotten their students to register.  This seemed to work very well. In the end 218 students and their teachers registered for these sessions. 

Stephanie and I planned lessons together that included about 5 multiple choice warm up questions, instruction and a free response. We took turns presenting the sessions and running all the behind the scene tasks. While one person presented the other person, started the recordings, took attendance - once at the start and once at the end, and most importantly answered student questions that were entered into the chat window.  Along the way, they would flag the presenter when clarification was needed. 

During the session, another one of our stellar teachers, Karen Curtis of Collins Hill, created an assignment for students who were watching the recordings. These were distributed to teachers so that students could watch the sessions, answer the questions and prove that the session was viewed.  The questions ranged from content, to tips that were provided during the session, and even mistakes that the presenters made.... students truly had to watch the recording to answer the questions.

What struck me most about doing these sessions, was how enthusiastic both the students and teachers were at attending them.  If the students' teacher was not in attendance, students remarked, "where is _________ tonight".  They really appreciated their teachers taking time in the evening to spend with them. All the teachers pitched in to answer questions and to help keep the students on track.  On one occasion when Mrs. Curtis was unable to attend, Ray Parsons from Gwinnett School of Math, Science and Technology filled in for her.  I am so impressed with our teachers and their dedication.  I feel blessed that I have the privilege to work with such awesome people. 


Challenges

We did have some challenges implementing these sessions. And will make improvements for next year. 

One challenge / blessing was the sheer number of students who attended. The first several sessions we had over 100 students.  About mid way through, the attendance tapered off to about 70.  When there were 100 students, it made managing the session very difficult.  We had to establish some norms for how they behaved in the session. 

• We removed their ability to draw on the whiteboard.
• We encouraged them to be sure their conversations were school appropriate and reminded them that these sessions were recorded. 
• We had to remind students to not have side conversations during the session, because this made keeping up with questions very difficult.  The chat window in collaborate scrolls each time a student enters a post, so it is very hard to scroll up and see what someone has posted. 
• We utilized the polling so that students were not entered answers into the chat. 
• Instructed them to use the emoticons that were next to their name vs. posting smile faces into the chat box. 

All in all, students behaved themselves very well without too much redirection.

Drop in Attendance


We did see a decline in attendance over time.  Some of this could be attributed to a lack of email reminders and activities at local schools. This is a busy time of year for schools with award banquets, prom, etc.  After the first few sessions, we didn't send emails every time because there were so many email addresses that it made using web mail very difficult.  At first we didn't realize how vital these emails were, because the link didn't change from week to week. But not all students realized that they could use the same link, and so they didn't attend. We will be sure to send email reminders prior to each session. We could also utilize remind101 to have students sign up to receive text reminders. This service would allow us to schedule reminders  ahead of time, to be sent the day of the review. Many of our students are more apt to pay attention to a text then they are to look at email. 

Incentives for Students

Each teacher handled this incentive in their own way. Several required students to attend and complete an assignment that was graded. Sessions were recorded, so if a student couldn't attend, they were still able to get credit by watching the recording and turning in the assignment. Others gave drop grades or extra credit for attendance. 

Follow up
We will be sending students a follow up survey about these review sessions.  We would like to know what they liked? What they thought was most helpful? What they would like to see more of? What they didn't like? What they thought we could cut out? We are also curious to see if the number of session and topics were appropriate.  Would students like more sessions? Or fewer? What additional topics would they like to see offered? 

Conclusion
This was a huge success! Beyond anything I expected. We have about 400 students enrolled in AP CS A across our county and we had 1/4 of them attending on a regular basis. I mark this in the success column. The students and teachers were great.  And best of all the sessions were free to them!

We will DEFINITELY be looking at offering these again next year.  In the mean time, teachers are planning to utilize the recordings in their classrooms. 

Click here for recordings.

Crystal L. Furman

I have been a computer science teacher for the past 15 years.  I have taught in two different (very different) high schools in my career, one in the north, south of Buffalo, NY, and one in the south, northeast of Atlanta.  I have taught computer science using Pascal, Visual Basic, C++ and Java.  So, why am I starting a Blog now? 
    First, let me introduce myself.  My name is Crystal Furman, and I teach at the best high school in Georgia... Brookwood High School in Snellville, GA.  At least I think it is the best!  I have been teaching here for 6 years, after my husband took a job near Atlanta.  Over the past several years, I have grown the computer science program at Brookwood from 1 section of AP Computer Science A and 1 section of Beginning Programming, with 100% male participants to 2 sections of AP Computer Science A and 3 sections of Beginning Programming, where we will be piloting the CS Principles course. We have also recruited more females into our classes, with about 15% female.  We are making great strides, and have awesome community and administrative support.
    I have tried to blog in the past, but honestly didn't know if anyone would read my blog. Now that I have decided to pilot the CS Principles course, I feel that a blog could be very beneficial. In addition, I am a program specialist for computer science for my county. As such, I have quite a few teachers who are interested in sharing teaching practices with me. I am hoping that through this blog I will be able to have a regular forum for posting lessons and reflection. 
    At first I was thinking this would just be a blog for CS Principles, but I also see that this would be beneficial for AP Computer Science A as well.  I hope to utilize this blog for my own personal reflections, for others to benefit from my experiences, and as a forum for positive discussion. 
    Thank you for reading!  Crystal L. Furman