Teaching Coding at Special Needs Summer School
Just finished the first week (3 days) of DDME/AU (special needs) summer school. I donât think Iâve ever experienced anything as active, exhausting, stressful, or as exhilarating, outside of contact sports. (Fortunately there hasnât been any direct contact, so far.) We are settling into a total enrolment that seems to be north of 60 students, organized into a rotation of five 45 minute periods a day. The needs are variable, but not as extreme a range as day school. Most (not all) of these students are verbal and can work within a ratio of 4 students to 1 adult. Many are on the autism spectrum and some show signs of OCD or hyperactivity. Iâve set myself the task of introducing them to computer coding. Almost all are familiar with computer devices to some extent, mostly through gaming, but none has done coding.
Because of last minute uncertainty about rooms, Iâve started in a classroom totally devoid of computers, except for a Smart Board. Actually it was a fortunate circumstance. Getting the students away from the computers allowed me to observe them in social interactions and get a feel for capabilities and problems.
I had decided to start with an âunpluggedâ activity, that teaches some of the principles behind computing without using an actual machine. Pixel Art is that cool low-res style of graphic used in classic games like Mario Brothers, and thatâs our topic. csunplugged.com (Colour by Numbers) and learn.code.org (Graph Paper Programming) both have printable activities available on-line to translate numbers or simple picture symbols into graphics.
Colour by Numbers uses a simple form of coding compression so that you donât have to individually specify the colour of each square (pixel) in the picture. Great lesson and important concept, but from experiments in my regular class, not the place to start a DD class. Graph Paper Programming uses simple symbols like arrows and coloured in squares to take you on a tour of your piece of graph paper colouring it in as you go along. Both these tutorials mimic tasks and/or symbols done while programming with a block programming language like Scratch (scratch.mit.edu). I wanted a simple easy activity: that almost everyone could do, that wouldnât shut anyone down because it was too hard (especially the adults), and that demonstrated some fundamental coding concepts.
I decided on Pixel Art, because it draws attention to the fact that the computer screen image is made up of individual pixels. I wanted to individually specify the pixels with a number, demonstrating first of all, that numbers could be translated into graphics, and by analogy that programming is a kind of code, just like spies might use. More than that, Pixel Art is cool, and when translated from an array of numbers on graph paper, a mystery, a surprise! The image is not readily discernible to the average person. Figuring out what the image is, makes it a puzzle or game. It becomes a tool for engagement. We started with small black and white images specified by a binary code (0 or 1). We then increased the number of possible states for each pixel by adding more numbers and therefore more colours.
"Will this picture turn out to be Mario or Sonic?!" Engagement was pretty well complete among the 60 plus students we had each day. (A couple Thinsation cookies on Friday helped a bit.) Not all students had the motor skills or cognitive abilities to accomplish the task and required some modification and assistance. There were only 2 individuals who did not comply at all. One was so hyperactive that he literally couldnât sit down for more than a couple of minutes. He was giving the E.A.s, who had to follow him from class to class, fits. I noticed that he was not trying to leave the classroom, but was merely gravitating to the windows near the glass door that exits the class. So I set up a space for him beside a window away from the door and restricted his movement with tables and desks. He was free to stand up and look out the window, or to work on the assignment, or read a newspaper we got for him.
The second student had decided he was not going to do what everyone else was, or what I wanted. I had offered him an alternative assignment. From his conversations with other students, I noticed that he considered himself an expert on Minecraft. I then offered him an opportunity to create a presentation on it for the class using my office. The office is within the classroom space and has glass walls and an open door. I've cleared it out to use as a calming room or for projects like this. I brought in a computer, which he set up. There were 10 minutes of him trying to look at inappropriate YouTube videos, and reminders that he was being given special privileges and therefore there were special expectations of him, before he set to work. He worked right through his snack break. I'm hoping to get him into the coding tutorials next week by allowing him to assemble and use a miniature Raspberry Pi computer.
On Monday we start with the Hour of Code tutorials. I'll introduce them on the Smart Board. Here's hoping the internet is up!
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