Part of Competency #3: The CS Standards
Introduction
In the main activity this week you completed the third of four modules prepared by the state of Iowa Board of Education and AEAs. This module focused on the CSTA/Iowa CS Student Standards. In this followup to that material, I would like you to take some time to discuss the standards from the grade band most appropriate to your classroom(s). This will be part of your deliverable for Competency #3
Deliverable, Part 2
This will look and feel very similar to an activity you completed in Teaching and Learning Programming. But at that time we limited our discussion to the programming standards. For this activity I would like you to consider the full set of standards from your grade band.
Consider the CSTA K-12 CS Standards Progression Chart (pages 4-6 in the standards document). Regardless of which grade band you teach at, I want you to carefully consider each of the grand band columns:
- Column 1a = Lower Elementary
- Column 1b = Upper Elementary
- Column 2 = Middle School
- Column 3a = Standards for all High School students
- NOTE that there are standards labeled 3B which are not in this table and I will not ask you to consider for this activity. However, in explanation, those standards are for HS students who take multiple semesters and advanced CS courses.
- You can consider 3A as standards for ALL HS students and 3B as standards for those who specialize in CS beyond the basics.
Let's dig in and focus on one grade band of your choice. Please expand the grade band you choose below. Again, you will only complete this for ONE of the four grade bands below. NOTE: This will feel familiar. You did an abbreviated version of this activity focusing only on the programming standards as part of the Teaching and Learning Programming course. For that activity you used a Google Form to submit your results.
Lower Elementary (Level 1A Standards)
- Read through 1A-CS-01 to 1A-IC-18 in the progression chart. Additionally, you should examine the detailed version of these standards from the full document (pp 7-11)
- For each of these 18 standards I want you think through what you have learned so far in our course sequence. Answer the following questions:
- Do you feel like you observed this standard in the way the courses were taught?
- If "yes" - When and/or how
- If "no" - What kind of activity do you think this course could have utilized to better address this standard?
- [Note, I realize that for one or two of these if the answer is "No" it may be hard for you to answer this question since you may not know what the standard is saying. But for many others I think you will understand the standard even without direct instruction and I think you can imagine/envision activities that would have addressed this standard. Please give this question an honest attempt at an answer.]
- Do you feel like you have enough introduction to this standard to think about incorporating it into your classroom?
- If "yes" - What kinds of activities (in addition to the ones you observed in our classroom) do you feel would address this standard.
- If "no" - Why not [Again, this is tightly tied to the No in part 1 but it is actually a different question.
- Do you feel like you observed this standard in the way the courses were taught?
Upper Elementary (Level 1B Standards)
- Read through 1B-CS-01 to 1B-IC-21 in the progression chart. Additionally, you should examine the detailed version of these standards from the full document (pp 12-17)
- For each of these 21 standards I want you think through what you have learned so far in our course sequence. Answer the following questions:
- Do you feel like you observed this standard in the way the courses were taught?
- If "yes" - When and/or how
- If "no" - What kind of activity do you think this course could have utilized to better address this standard?
- [Note, I realize that for one or two of these if the answer is "No" it may be hard for you to answer this question since you may not know what the standard is saying. But for many others I think you will understand the standard even without direct instruction and I think you can imagine/envision activities that would have addressed this standard. Please give this question an honest attempt at an answer.]
- Do you feel like you have enough introduction to this standard to think about incorporating it into your classroom?
- If "yes" - What kinds of activities (in addition to the ones you observed in our classroom) do you feel would address this standard.
- If "no" - Why not [Again, this is tightly tied to the No in part 1 but it is actually a different question.
- Do you feel like you observed this standard in the way the courses were taught?
Middle School (Level 2 Standards)
- Read through 2-CS-01 to 2-IC-23 in the progression chart. Additionally, you should examine the detailed version of these standards from the full document (pp 18-23)
- For each of these 23 standards I want you think through what you have learned so far in our course sequence. Answer the following questions:
- Do you feel like you observed this standard in the way the courses were taught?
- If "yes" - When and/or how
- If "no" - What kind of activity do you think this course could have utilized to better address this standard?
- [Note, I realize that for one or two of these if the answer is "No" it may be hard for you to answer this question since you may not know what the standard is saying. But for many others I think you will understand the standard even without direct instruction and I think you can imagine/envision activities that would have addressed this standard. Please give this question an honest attempt at an answer.]
- Do you feel like you have enough introduction to this standard to think about incorporating it into your classroom?
- If "yes" - What kinds of activities (in addition to the ones you observed in our classroom) do you feel would address this standard.
- If "no" - Why not [Again, this is tightly tied to the No in part 1 but it is actually a different question.
- Do you feel like you observed this standard in the way the courses were taught?
High School (Level 3A Standards)
- Read through 3A-CS-01 to 3A-IC-30 in the progression chart. Additionally, you should examine the detailed version of these standards from the full document(pp 24-31)
- For each of these 30 standards I want you think through what you have learned so far in our course sequence. Answer the following questions:
- Do you feel like you observed this standard in the way the courses were taught?
- If "yes" - When and/or how
- If "no" - What kind of activity do you think this course could have utilized to better address this standard?
- [Note, I realize that for one or two of these if the answer is "No" it may be hard for you to answer this question since you may not know what the standard is saying. But for many others I think you will understand the standard even without direct instruction and I think you can imagine/envision activities that would have addressed this standard. Please give this question an honest attempt at an answer.]
- Do you feel like you have enough introduction to this standard to think about incorporating it into your classroom?
- If "yes" - What kinds of activities (in addition to the ones you observed in our classroom) do you feel would address this standard.
- If "no" - Why not [Again, this is tightly tied to the No in part 1 but it is actually a different question.
- Do you feel like you observed this standard in the way the courses were taught?
For this activity I am asking you to consider the entire standards strand of your selection (All five concepts from the framework. Not just the Algorithms and Programming concept).
Evaluation
- This is included as the second part of Competency 3.