Our Journey

Questions we have progressively been asking:

• What skills are important for our kids’ futures?
• Can we create a space for ALL children to experience tinkering, making, designing and creating?
• Can we make this a collaborative space for parents and children to work in also?
• Can we utilise the skills and expertise of our parents?
• Can we involve our teachers in this vision and is this likely to extend into classrooms and curriculum?

ICT Explorers:

Out of our BYO Program have come many realisations.  One is the power of the skills that the students quickly develop to use ICT to communicate, create and collaborate.  These skills have the power to change the world and it is important that they are allowed to work in a space that allows them to realise this.   ICT Explorers is a project that provides such a forum.  Its motto is ‘Where Will ICT Take You?” and it encourages children to work on a project that has real world implications.   This is when the use of ICT is the most powerful – when it is being used to inquire, explore, answer questions and pose answers and solutions.

In 2014 – two groups of Year 4 students submitted two projects – one on homelessness and one on sustainability.   These two project were shortlisted and went through to the judging event.

In 2015 – four groups of students (Years 4-6) submitted their projects.  One is on Dangers of Pollution, one is on CyberSafety, one is a persuasive project about public spaces for grafitti and one is titled ‘The World’s Big Problems”.   On the judging day – our Year 4 group were awarded first place in their category with our Year 6 boys – Ben and Scott – awarded 2nd place in a very crowded field.

Interestingly enough, another group of boys who didn’t submit had worked on using the intel Galileo boards and had decided they needed more support and assistance and would work towards submitting next year.

Our Year 4 group travelled to the National Finals in Sydney and were thrilled to be involved and excited to see the standard of entries from all over Australia.

In 2015 Oakleigh students visited EduTech after  communicating with Gary Stager who was running a MakerSpace within the Exhibition Hall.

Super Awesome Sylvia was there:

 The students used LittleBits, made wearable art, played with a MakeyMakey and much more.

We visited The Cube at QUT:

Gavin Winter, one of our parents, showed us the technology they work with on a daily basis and the exhibits they create to showcase these technologies.

We considered the materials and human resources we had:

Mr Bayliss already runs a terribly successful Robotics Club.

We already have a ‘maker’ type mentality in our Library and within our BYO program with digital devices creating products to demonstrate their learning.   Minecraft EDU is currently being used by a couple of classes and we are soon to start a club.   Coding is of interest to our students and teachers with iPad apps making this very accessible. We have already used Scratch within learning unit.

Construction gear is already a popular option in our Library in the breaks and we acknowledge we need more of such materials.

We received a trial of a 3D printer:

Education QLD gave us a trial of an UP mini 3D printer.  This has created a real buzz in our school and the students are enjoying having it in our library.  At the moment we are learning lots about it, printing out lots of things, failing and learning as we go.   One of our successful Young ICT Explorer Groups incorporated 3D printing as their Blender animation was able to export their creations as 3D models.

We were loaned some materials:

 

We started introducing materials with a ‘Pop-Up Maker Table’ each week.

Our first one was LittleBits.

After that we have put out the Goldiblox Engineering kits and a table with 3D printing apps on iPads.

We announced a Book Week competition for 3D printing and hosted a visit by Peter and Andy – creators who use 3D printing in their work.

We acquired some OzoBots and are looking forward to learning more about them.

A MakeyMakey was set up connected to a desktop with Scratch installed.

Edison Robots were set up on another table.

We experimented and tinkered with a wide range of materials including sphero:

 

2016

Exciting times ahead.  Oakleigh State School has been identified as a ‘launch school’ for the new Digital Technologies Curriculum and our principal Grant Baker, been invited to speak at the FutureSchools Conference in March on the implementation of this curriculum.  We also hosted some round table discussions on Queensland’s agenda and Nicola was to hold session on the programs our school had implemented.

Our approach at Oakleigh State School will be that much of this curriculum can be approached in a cross curricular way and that our MakerSpace can certainly play a key role in enhancing the development of computational thinking.  The mindset that must be present in a successful makerspace –  tinkering, designing, making –   is one that will be one of the pieces of the puzzle that enable a successful implementation of this curriculum at our school.

February, 2016

Three weeks into this year and our new RoboTrolley is taking shape.  Our Makerspace is due to start this week with our TechKids meeting to decide on the way forward. We have classroom teachers already choosing to design learning that supports this curriculum, using tools that we will provide to them.  This includes ‘unplugged’ type activities in addition those those that the use of technology can support.

March, 2016

The TechKIDS have been running activities in our MakerSpace Tuesday – Thursday.  The fact that this is student directed is tremendously important feature.   I think at the end of this term, we need to give some of these kids added focus….but for the first time, when they were all learning about the robotics gear we had acquired – this play and sharing time was necessary.  We have talked about also adding a session during which they get taught something.  We have mentioned TinkerCAD 3d printing as an early possibility.

The activities that have been running that have been facilitated by Yr 5 TechKIDS:

1.  OzoBots – Tuesday and Thursday
2. Robotics – Tuesday – Thursday. This has included Dash, Ollie and Sphero.
3. Minecraft – Tuesday and Thursday:  The girls running this group are about to start setting up their own server.
4. Coding – using Scratch Jn – a workshop for younger children on a Thursday

Other non-facilitated activities include:  lego, stop motion animation, 3D printing, construction and building.

FutureSchools  As a school we were invited to present at FutureSchools with Mr Baker and I speaking on a round table discussion about the AdvancingEducation agenda for QLD, Mr Baker presenting on a panel about the Digital Technologies Curriculum and then I was presenting on ‘Supporting Young Innovators’. This was a wonderful opportunity for us as a school to discuss with others what we were doing to implement this new curriculum – with many features of the MakerSpace and Maker mentality being included.

 

Late March:  I have been to a LEGO WeDO workshop at The Cube at QUT.  This is quite amazing gear for younger students in areas of Science.   For our Young Innovators Program, it is likely we will purchase a small number of kits in order to investigate curriculum links.

A robot that has been designed and built to explore the concepts of ‘push’ and ‘pull’.   One of the activities was to measure weights the robot was able to pull.   We were able to adjust parts to ensure that greater and greater weights could be pulled.

In other news, the Think Tank that has been held for our community was absolutely fantastic and you can read more about this on the following blog pages:

https://osstechenablinglearning.edublogs.org/2016/02/15/invitation-to-support-our-innovators/

https://osstechenablinglearning.edublogs.org/2016/03/09/think-tank-supporting-our-young-innovators/

https://osstechenablinglearning.edublogs.org/2016/03/19/oakleighs-young-innovator-program/

The type of program that may result from this work will almost directly support the MakerEd developments in our Makerspace.  After all, we know that the most important feature of MakerEd is the appropriate mindset.  Having activities running after school will be wonderful……wouldn’t it be terrific however, if this led to possibilities being realised about links to learning within the curriculum.

Currently we have possibilities emerging as a result of a ‘CodeTheFuture’ volunteer and some parental involvement.   Whether this whole program will be successful or not will be largely determined by whether we can initiate and sustain such community links.

Our meeting for those interested in Young ICT Explorers

Young ICT Explorer Competition

April, 2016

We have started the term off in sprinting fashion with our Young Innovator Program about to start, Young ICT Explorers all mad keen to make an impact and our new MakerSpace Lunchtime Program up and operating.

We have also added some contact to a couple of our tables which make them into horizontal whiteboards.  We hope that this will create some surfaces on which the students can brainstorm, plan, prototype and plan:

 

September, 2016

We are just at the end of a term when Book Week and involvement in Young ICT Explorers were the focus areas.    We have also just completed our Round Two of the Young Innovator Program.   Equipment we used as part of this round two include MBots and Makey-Makey devices.    I am looking forward to including these in our MakerSpace in Term 4.

We have also spoken at the Criterion Digital Technologies Conference – speaking about our approach to the Digital Technologies Curriculum.

I am looking forward to launching our Term 4 Makerspace.   The next two weeks will allow us to set things up in preparation.  Already we have added some wall brackets to hold our LittleBits, and added a second RoboTrolley to the downstairs area of the Library.