It was bound to happen.
I try my very best to keep up with what is happening in education right now. I've read a few things about maker culture and coding and identified that they would be next steps for my own development. I have enrolled in workshops at ULearn to help me get a firmer understanding of what that would look like in my classroom (and to give me hands on experience).
Too late!
Both these things are sneaking their way into my classroom. It's like I have left the door open wide enough that students have enough agency to share what their aspirations are.
The first time I noticed something was when I "caught" some kids hiding behind my teacher station writing their own version of code. Then there were bits of paper with coded messages. Then there was something written on my whiteboard.
And then a student said to me "I want to know how you make the internet and websites! How do you create all that?"
Perhaps the most powerful question I have had this year.
This lead to an amazing learning conversation with my student looking at me for the first half of the conversation like "do you actually know what I am asking you?" and then with high raised eyebrows and a whopping big smile when I showed him code.org and scratch websites.
The next day he came back to school telling me that he had already created a game using code.
The moral of the story is that you can't stop the inevitable from happening. Our learners are consuming, filtering, modifying and exploring ideas at an amazing rate. Bring it on I say!
