02/06/2022
I have been working on creating SAGs for Grade 8 and Grade 9 based on the draft Coding and Robotics Curriculum released in March 2020. I have received many requests for an IT/CAT/Robotics curriculum for Grade 8 and Grade 9 and since most IT/CAT teachers are overloaded and do not have time to develop a cohesive curriculum for the lower grades, I decided to develop a curriculum assuming that most Grade 8 and 9 students have had little or no exposure to coding, robotics, office applications and computing concepts etc.
Since coding and robotics is the new buzz word, I am seeing a lot of content being taught without much thought to designing good, reliable, scalable, reusable code. I am deeply concerned that learners are going to pick up many bad habits that we as IT teachers will have to unteach. The books I am developing for Grade 8 and Grade 9 aim to teach coding using the principles of computational thinking, which includes evaluating code, optimising code, choosing the best coding structures etc. with tools like good old tracetables. It will also include "robotics" i.e., electronic circuits and components, parallel and series circuits and investigate ohm's law - V=IR.
Our challenge in South Africa is that most teachers at the Grade 8 and Grade 9 level have not any tertiary training in coding and it is left up to the IT teacher (who is probably running the school network, teaching CAT and running the scoreboard for cricket) to design a Grade 8 and Grade 9 curriculum and train staff to teach it. For this reason the books will be designed assuming that both the teacher and learners have no prior IT/CAT knowledge or skills. The curriculum will be large and divided into compulsory sections and optional sections. The optional sections can be used to extend learners or provide differentiated learning for learners who have some prior knowledge and skills. There will be a detailed Teacher's Guide and solutions available to support teachers.
I am going to hold an online meeting on Monday 13 June at 7pm to discuss how I plan to implement a condensed version of the coding and robotics syllabus (Grade 0 to Grade 9) for Grade 8 and Grade 9 based on my adapted SAGs for Grade 8 and Grade 9. Currently, the Grade 8 book (due Sept 2022) will briefly cover the basics of:
Hardware
Software
Networking
Digital Citizenship
Data Representation
Files and Folders
Word
Excel
PowerPoint*
Video Editing*
Introduction to Computational Thinking in Scratch Programming (block based coding)
Introduction to Designing Circuits with MicroBits and Arduino (simulated or real) in TinkerCAD*
Block based coding with Circuits in TinkerCAD.*
* Optional Sections
Please complete the form if you would like to attend online: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScJ4qH4w3ygjIPWkRDJvIxcyZyVNMiwZ-X4HyfVE2XijH30Ow/viewform?usp=sf_link
The link to the Google Meet is available in the form.
Please complete this form if you plan to attend the online meeting Monday 13 June at 7pm. Link to Meeting: https://meet.google.com/mws-nsqb-zbv
