Today's tasks
Weeks 3, 4, and 5 — The Arc Becomes Visible
There is no class meeting today due to the UNI Day of Service events. You will need to complete this analysis on your own. Please come to class on Friday prepared to talk with your group about what you observed when completing this activity. You will notice yellow discussion boxes on this page as usual. Since there is no class session, jot down a few notes on your own as you work — Sprint 3 will open with a short small-group discussion where you will share what you noticed.
Today covers three weeks of content. By now you know this curriculum's lesson structure well enough to move efficiently — you are reading for patterns and building toward an argument, not exploring the format for the first time.
Step 1 — Work through Weeks 3, 4, and 5 and extend your char (25 min)
Add three rows to the chart you started in Sprint 1. Keep the same four columns. Move at teacher pace — you are looking for what is new, different, or building on what came before, not reading every word of every activity.
| What CS concept is introduced, and how does the curriculum explain it to students in everyday terms? | What role does the subject matter play? Is it doing conceptual work, or providing familiar context? | What is the CS+Me topic, and how well does it connect to what students are learning that week? | One specific thing you would change about this week, and why. | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Week 3 | ||||
| Week 4 | ||||
| Week 5 |
Step 2 — Reconnect to TIPP&SEE (5 min)
In the first two days of this project you spent a lot of time with the TIPP&SEE framework — the strategy the curriculum uses to teach students how to read a Scratch project before modifying it. Since then, you have been reading lesson pages without necessarily thinking about TIPP&SEE explicitly.
Take a few minutes now, without going back to re-read the lessons, to answer this question in your head: in the lessons you read today, did you see TIPP&SEE still doing active work? Or did it fade into the background as the CS concepts became more complex?
Be prepared to discuss with your group: TIPP&SEE was introduced as the foundational framework for how students approach every Scratch project in this curriculum. Looking across Weeks 3, 4, and 5: is TIPP&SEE still structurally present in the lessons, or does it quietly disappear once students are expected to know it? What does a teacher need to do to keep that framework alive across five weeks of instruction — and does this curriculum make that easy or hard?
Step 3 — A quick cross-unit look (10 min)
You have now built a fairly detailed picture of your own unit's arc across five weeks. Take 10 minutes to browse the home page of one other unit — not your own. You are not trying to know it as well as yours. You are looking for one specific thing it does differently.
- CS+Fables — Unit 1, Grade 3
- CS+Data — Unit 2, Grade 3
- CS+Community — Unit 3, Grade 4
- CS+Earth — Unit 4, Grade 4
Be prepared to discuss with your group: What is one specific thing the unit you visited does differently from yours — in its CS concept sequence, how it connects to its subject area, or how it structures its weeks? Why do you think the curriculum authors made a different choice in that unit? Does the difference make you think more or less of either unit?
For your project document
Former Day 5 Reflection Questions
Record your responses to these questions in your reflection document. Be prepared to discuss them with your group before the end of class.
- As you wrap up today, you have now seen three weeks of CS concept instruction in your unit. Looking across Weeks 1, 2, and 3 together: is there a cumulative arc building toward something, or does each week feel largely self-contained? What evidence from the lessons supports your answer?
- The CS+Fables unit spends two consecutive weeks on the concept of Event before moving on, while other units introduce a new concept each week. What might be the reasoning behind that choice? What does it suggest about how the curriculum thinks about depth versus breadth in CS concept development at the elementary level?
- You have now seen three CS+Me digital citizenship lessons in your unit. Looking at them as a set: do they form a coherent progression, or are they essentially independent? How would you evaluate the quality of the connection between each CS+Me topic and the CS content of its week?
Former Day 6 Reflection Questions
Record your responses to these questions in your reflection document. Be prepared to discuss them with your group before the end of class.
- As you wrap up today, you have now read all five content weeks of your unit. Looking at the full arc of CS concepts from Week 1 through Week 5: how would you describe the overall progression to someone who hadn't seen the curriculum? What is the curriculum trying to build in students over these five weeks?
- Some units end Week 5 by introducing a final CS concept, while others use Week 5 as a synthesis or application week with no new concept introduced. What are the tradeoffs of each approach? Which approach does your unit take, and do you think it was the right choice for the subject matter and audience?
- You have now seen all five CS+Me digital citizenship lessons in your unit. Looking at the complete set: does the curriculum treat digital citizenship as a coherent thread woven through the unit, or as a series of loosely related topics inserted week by week? How would you redesign the CS+Me sequence if you wanted it to feel more intentional — or do you think the current approach is already working?