This project is part of the Black History Month celebration because it supports a Black teacher or a school where the majority of the students are Black.
My Students
I teach at a model school that incorporates performing arts, visual arts, coding, computer science, financial literacy, and STEM (STEAM) within the curriculum. Our urban school receives federal funding for programs that provide free breakfast and lunch for every student, and Title I services to economically disadvantaged boys and girls.
We are a class which includes military families, gifted/talented students, ESL/ELL students, inclusion/special education students, and the tech savvy.
My students are energetic and very busy within the classroom. Even with parental support, I would love to say that my students have everything that they need to be successful. But they don't. We are preparing students for college, the workforce, and the world beyond, so they can have a better life.
My Project
Our Family Coding Night gets a little bigger each year. This is our third coding night and each year we develop more engaging activities and ways for our students to show their parent how computer science education has been integrated into our classroom instruction. This year we want to set off Breakout sessions for each grade-level and create a school-wide challenge. Which grade-level and their parents can break the code first? Our students love using their critical thinking skills to become the best problem-solvers that our school has. The requested Breakout EDU kits is in a school bundle providing 6 kits and platform access; one per grade level and the iPad mini will allow access to the online component during our Family Coding Night.
Parent involvement and family engagement is very important to continue connecting students to their education.
We will start our Family Coding Night by sending home grade level flyers created by each class with the beginning clue for the night. This will build the anticipation for the events. Families will have a chance to work together around the school to gather the clues and see if they will be able to break the code and unlock their case. Students will be able to help their parents by getting new clues when they visit the other coding activities station that night. They will be able to make music using block programming with Osmo and Get-to-Know the Principal with an Ozobot Bingo game. The addition of the Breakout boxes will be a great way to end the night and let our parents know that we are working together to make sure that our students, their children, are ready for 21st century jobs by integrating computer science education.
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As a teacher-founded nonprofit, we're trusted by thousands of teachers and supporters across the country. This classroom request for funding was created by Mrs. Richardson and reviewed by the DonorsChoose team.
