Computational Thinking in K8 – Building a Language of Problem Solving

July 10-11, 2024 (12CTLE) @The American Museum of Natural History

Led by Greg Benedis-Grab and Kate Macaulay

STEMteachersNYC invites K-8 teachers of all subjects to join a unique learning opportunity July 10-11, 2024 to incorporate computational thinking into your existing curriculum! This program is free to participating teachers.

Bring the language of problem solving to your classroom! Use computational thinking and apply programming to real world scenarios and interdisciplinary examples from real world classrooms! Abstraction, Logic, Evaluation and more – the concepts and approaches of computational thinking can help students think through and tackle projects and problems, and to work as a team and communicate solutions. Computation has become an integral part of every scientific field. Today’s scientists leverage computational tools, use computation as a model for thinking, conduct their investigations with computation and often must contribute to the design of the computational tools for their specific research. The NGSS emphasize the role of authentic professional practices in teaching science. One of the eight practices is computational thinking.

Over the course of this two-day workshop participants will engage with practical tools and pedagogical approaches developed by Cornell Tech’s TIR teachers and STEMteachersNYC, to adapt and incorporate the Barefoot Computing Framework of computational thinking concepts and skills into your existing curriculum and your school’s long term goals.

OUTCOMES

• Strengthen your school community & expand your professional network.
• Engage in cutting edge, easily implemented strategies to scaffold Computational Thinking into your teaching.
• Participants will be offered ongoing support by the STEMteachersNYC team.

Curricular alignment (3-8 public) – Aligns with 3-8 EngageNY ELA and Math Curriculum. Equipment Needs/Requirements – none! Micro:Bit kits will be provided.

An introduction to computational thinking and coding for teachers, this 2-day workshop focuses on building an understanding of computational thinking and exploring how to emphasize, enhance and extend computational thinking in science curricular materials. Participants will learn computer science concepts such as algorithms, loops, and conditionals and engage in hands-on computational thinking or coding exercises. This workshop offers a module on computational thinking, followed by a module on Micro:Bit for beginners, and culminates in small group integration planning time so that participants can adapt and incorporate computational thinking concepts and skills into their existing curriculum and their school’s long term goals, as well as immediately implement strategies and tools in the classroom.

Cost: (Limited # of tickets!)

Regular Teacher Price $140

School Price $200

STEMteachersNYC delivers professional development workshops for teachers, by teachers, about teaching, since 2011. All workshops over 2hrs offer CTLE. CUNY Pre-service teachers may attend for free. Please reach out if your school requires an invoice. We are an NYCDOE MTAC Vendor.

Current CUNY students with valid ID may attend summer workshops at a discount or for FREE! Please email [email protected] for details.

Email general questions to [email protected]. Note this workshop requires a minimum number of participants. In the event there are not enough participants, the workshop will be cancelled, and a refund will be issued.

Interested in an Invoice/Purchase Order Request?

Teachers! Ask your school to pay for your ticket! All the school needs to do is send us a Purchase Order (PO). Fill out our PO/Invoice survey and we will prepare you an invoice for you to submit to your school/district. Or just copy and paste the information above and let them know the workshop you want to attend. Don’t be afraid to ask. There’s always a chance the money will be available and they’ll say yes, but if you don’t ask, there’s no chance at all.

Districts/Schools, to request an invoice for a STEMteachersNYC Workshop, please fill out a quick invoice survey. This is a required step in order to process your request. Any questions regarding the PO process please contact [email protected]

Please send Purchase Orders (POs) to our Billing Office

Via Email: [email protected]

OR Via US Mail: STEMteachersNYC – Billing Office 245 West 107th Street, Suite 10B New York, NY 10025.

Please read the FAQs section below carefully before registering.

Please note: We take screenshots, photographs and record video of our workshops in order to publicize a positive image of science teaching, and of STEMteachersNYC – a recognized 501(c)(3) non-profit organization – and to support future teacher leaders. If you register, you are agreeing to be photographed and to have your voice and image video-recorded. You are also agreeing to relinquish all your rights to the photographs and video recordings.

If you do not wish to be photographed or video-recorded – you must inform us before the workshop starts. For in-person workshops, we will take one photograph of your face so that we can erase your image if we happen to catch it by chance during the workshop, and we will do our best to avoid you. We would also appreciate your cooperation in positioning yourself at the edge of the group so as to help us avoid you.