Awhile back I (well, the place where I work) was able to purchase 3 Bee-Bot “Hives.” A hive is 6 Bee-bots, a charger plate and a yellow backpack to carry everything around. Once I had them I quickly put together a class for Pre-K – 2 teachers. The first class met about a month ago and our next class met last night.
Along with the teachers sharing out what their students have been up to (they are so excited!!!) and me sharing a few more resources on our class “Bee-Bot” wiki page, I asked them to try out a collaborative Bee-Bot activity I thought up. Now to be fair I don’t know if others have thought of this before and done this already – so I don’t want to take undue credit. I was thinking about how to make what you do already with Bee-Bots have an even stronger collaborative bent when I came up with this:
Pair 2 pairs of students and their shared Bee-Bots and have them work together to choreograph a “dance.” Start on opposite sides of a table or facing each other on the floor. Start out having the Bee-Bots approach each other until they are face to face. Next keep adding to your program so the Bee-Bots go around each other, back and forth etc. They can keep adding commands to make their dance longer and more intricate.
Here is a video of one of the teachers “coding” her Bee-Bot with the program she and her partner designed:
Here is a clip of their Bee-Bot dance:
And here is a dance choreographed by another pair of teachers:
I’m looking forward to seeing their students taking on this challenge in the weeks ahead.
Learning is messy!
Wow-what a fun, and informative blog! You have a lot of great STEM ideas (with visuals), which is awesome for a third-grade teacher such as myself who is just developing their technology “wings.” Bee Bots look like the perfect fit for those of us just getting started with coding, and I can see how they can easily be utilized across grade levels and curriculum as mentioned on your Bee-Bot wiki page. I am definitely going to look into Bee Bots for our school and will be back to your excellent blog. Thank you!
Susan
The projects you and your students create and the depth of learning that occurs are inspiring! I found your blog while exploring a number of “connected principals” and educators and their blogs for a grad class. I was excited to see this post relating to younger students. As an Early Childhood educator, it can sometimes seem overwhelming or unattainable to provide little ones the same type of technology-rich learning experiences as older kids… but Bee Bots are a great example of how this CAN be done. My school has a set of Ozobots, and I’m excited to dig into using them even more with my kiddos next year! Thanks for the inspiration!
Hi Cait – Glad to offer some inspiration! Let me know how it goes!!