Quiet Leadership Pages 49-55: Professional Reading

Quiet Leadership by David Rock: Page 49-55 Summary
- Tally of number of times looking at problems and not solutions this week
- How much leeway can we give staff who want solutions to baseline issues (duty)
- Are we a School that encourages teachers to do their best and follow thier passion?

Digital Parents Group

I am still not sold on the name for the group, however as nothing better was available in the short term, its what we went with.  Previously we'd had a 'Digital Focus Group' which had met once a term in 2015-6.  Last year the group (which was concerned with BYOD policy and uptake) met infrequently and stopped mid yaer.  While this group was not started again an opportunity was made available for parents to drop in and see technology in action and discuss with staff.

Today the group had two session available to parents 9am-10am and 2pm-3pm.  There had been limited publicising of the event - it was via text message to parents twice.  The morning session saw the attendance of four parents, one BOT member, one new parent to School and two parents, husband and wife who had previously worked at the school.   We showed the parents the Beebots, Dash and Edison robots and discussed with them Computational Thinking.  I would rate this as successful although I would have liked additional attendance (also of note other mitigating factors were the weather was driving rain).  The afternoon session consisted of one pair of parents from the same classroom.   Again I re-worked the session from this morning.

While the numebrs were a little dissapointing I feel the start was positive.  The group has potential and enthusiam if the selected topics continue to be of interest.  We could also repeat the topic from today, as long as we advertised this clearly we would anticipate different parents would attend.  We didn't run an evening session as we were considering - its debatable as to how many parents would attend.

On reflection I feel the group has potential and would be an excellent source of feedback and ideas from parents, the key issue would be the attendance of differing parents and input.

Edison Robots - Bringing them in organically into Auroa Primary School

It is currently week nine of School term. Having just had a staff meeting when the subject of the TAI came up I thought that it would be apt to review the current situations relating to the use of the robots in the school.

Currently I have run sessions in four of the school classrooms - all junior school. I ran a thirty minute introduction session when I worked with the classroom teacher to promote the technology. We used a group of six robots. Following this two of the teachers accessed the technology to run additional sessions with thier classroom groups. In addition to that a teacher aide has used a robot to place in the classroom with two ORS funded students to engage them with their work.

EdisonIdeas2017 from myles webb on Vimeo.
Above: A Y2 class of students using the Edison in class in combination with blocks to 'park' the edison in a garage.  This session was run independently by the teacher without myself present.

I am currently scheduled to be in one of three remaining classrooms on Friday and will then take care of the last two classrooms as time permits (my release day is Friday and this is also a technology day). There have been some teething difficulty based around some of the use of robots - two of the initial six 'melted' due to a malfunction of the production process which caused replacement parts to be sent from Auckland.

This has left us with a set of thirteen robots, of these 12 are in regular classroom circulation and one is being reserved for the ORS funded students who are in the adjacent classroom.   Ideally the teachers would be seeking out the technology to use in conjunction with the students.  This has just started to happen but has not happened yet to the desired level and will remain a work in progress.

I have had six of these supplied by the Edison Company, who have also been made aware of my research and I have been asked as an official endorsement for the product for advertising.

Edison Robots - Suggested Lessons/Challenges

Edison Resources: Play Mat

While trawling through the existing 'Edison 2' resources from the official site I was able to locate this free downloadable play mat.  The resource looks excellent - it covers all the key expected areas of the bar code programming.   The next task associated with this is to locate a print shop capable of printing the mat A2 or A1 size and the contemplating of the laminating of such a sheet as it would be a heavy use object.   Given the multi-use of the mat I feel that it would be an excellent teaching resource and something to enable the teachers to use the technology in a meaningful way.  We are an extremely well resources school that has a multitude of resources including a variety of robots available to staff and students (including Beebots and Ozobots) my challenge is to ensure that the teachers are feeling empowered with the technology to use it, and then apply the computational thinking as a consequence for the students to be successful.

Edison 2 - Unexpected Line Tracking

We have completed a process whereby the Edison have now had their use modelled in the junior classrooms at Auroa Primary School.  I have spent ten to fifteen minutes in every classroom of the junior school with the classroom teacher present and modelled a basic start up lesson with the Edison.  As a result of which in one classroom a teacher has instigated a 'genius hour' with her students, and as part of this process a 'discovery' time was started with robots as a student option.  This required two Room Three (my) students to assist their students.   One of the Room Three students while working outside with these students experimented with the 'line tracking' option on the concrete area outside of the classroom - this is the result:
Edison Robot - Line Tracking Outside! from myles webb on Vimeo.
While the tracking was not perfect the actual line that it was following was not painted completely - and one would suspect that it would be possible to follow painted lines in an outside environment. There were grooves in the concrete at points that caused the Edison some difficulty - however it was an interesting addition to the Edisons capabilities.

Edison 2 - 'Build a bridge and get over it'.

A makeshift bridge created with rulers.

Challenge: For students to build a 'bridge' over three A4 sheets of card.  Students were able to use books, rulers and other objects within the classroom to complete the task.  They needed to start the Edison on one side of the 'river' and have it move to the other side of the river successfully.  Students were not able to construct in the 'river'.
Level: This task was completed by Y5/6 class of students 10 and 11 year olds.  The timeframe was thirty minutes from start to finish.  We allowed a five minute 'show' time when groups who were making progress towards the task showed evidence to the others in the class.
Notes: The initial start the students had the Edison in 'avoid obstacle' mode, this meant that the control of the Edison was somewhat difficult.  Most of the groups identified the need to switch the Edison to the 'clap controlled driving mode' which allowed them more control of the Edison along the 'bridge'.   One group opted to use the 'line tracking' bar code which they created by making their own tracking line with black vivid.   This was moderately successful because the line was inconsistent.   Several other groups attempted to create a 'channel' of books to have the robot bounce off.  'Clap controlled' driving was by far and away the most successful of the groups to complete the task.  Some of the groups used masking tape to apply it to the rulers and books to stabilize them as the Edison moved over them

Computational Thinking - Concepts and approaches.

I have spent some time researching computational thinking in preparation for my research and I feel that this chart is an excellent summary of the skills provided.

While it is officially a 'MOA' Kluster design and product it clearly takes its inspiration from elsewhere, in this case 'Barefoot Computing: Computing at School'.  Regardless of its origin, it contains the key elements that need to be applied in the context of using the Robots.   Tinkering/creating/debugging/perseverance/collaborating are all examples of practical use of robots that can fit in really, really well with the computational thinking.

During the course of today I conducted an introductory series of lessons with the classrooms in the junior school.  The purpose of the lessons were two fold - to engage the students in the use of the robots to get them enthused and think about the possibilities but also to do likewise for the staff and have them see the robots in a teaching situation.  We have significant resources here at school but sometimes, in my opinion there can be a disconnect between the resource and the teacher and especially in the case of technology.   I find the usability of the Edison off the charts in terms of how easy it can start working and its price point can't be matched.   The lessons that I went with today focussed on the starting of the robots, the play, stop and program button and then a single bar code reading of the robots to program it towards the 'clap' operated option.  I would consider it extremely successful.

Edison 2: Compatible with Lego

One of the tasks that I was looking to do with the Edison 2 was to increase its compatibility. Once the robot was unpacked with the setting of the machine (essentially straight from the box to start working) and the basic location tasks had been completed - looking to extend the students at a basic level. One of the positives that the Edison 2 has is that it is easily compatible with Lego. These designs here were completed by a six year old.

Left: Basic design added to Edison 2 with mixed lego pieces, the task was simply to add additional pieces and make sure that the robot would still work.  The wheels that are visible on the left and right of the wheels are for effect only and did not help with movement.  There were no restrictions on the shape of the vehicle the task was simply to create a car to ensure the Edison could still move. (the sensors cannot be covered over otherwise the machine will not function as expected).

 Left: to slightly make the task more inventive a challenge was made to produce a car/truck that would transport four lego figures without the figures falling out.  When the Edison 2 would come up against an obstacle it would 'push' against it which meant the design had to be made with a way to secure the lego figures.  The tasks were similar to the initial problem of travelling from one location to another, this time with the figures remaining safe.

 Left: to further make a challenge an object was introduced that was oversized and to cause the vehicle to be redesigned.  The back of the lego design needed to support the object and again the task was to transport the object from one location to another without the object on the back falling off.  As it was the design was able to support the object without modification with the design from the previous task of transporting the figures.

Left: Which led to the stacking of blocks onto the back of the Edison 2 design - the blocks were intended to be loose so that when they would react to obstacles the would tip off.  The intention of this was to have the student build support and consider the implications of the 'heavy load' of the blocks as it would be more of a challenge for the six year old.

Left: This was the final design by the six year old when the transportation tasks were complete.  The six year old decided to create something interesting with a working arm.  However this had limited mobility and was not the most practical in terms of getting to point A to B without items falling off.

This was an open task to allow the six year old to be creative without a specific end point.


Reflection: The Edison 2 is extremely compatible with Lego.  There was no set in particular that was used to integrate with it was a collection of lego sets and pieces and that just worked.  The practicality of it would be for a teacher/adult to purchase second hand set or lego pieces (wheels would need to be included in the set) to design a set of tasks with the Edison.  This of course takes into the account the students have a predisposition towards Lego and have the motor skills to create.