Even though I was intensely busy all week and didn’t have much time to work on my app or continue with the tutorial I’ve been using, there are a couple of things that really stand out to me regarding my learning process. None of this is really new, but since this Knowledge Object process is all about documenting our learning process, I think these might be good things to share with anyone undertaking a similar learning project.
Approaching Projects with Creativity and Interest
The requirements on this first project were simple and straightforward, and I could probably have made something much simpler and moved on more quickly. On the other hand, all of the extras that I added (styling the app a bit, having the app pick a random quote from a list instead of iterating through a list, adding a photo, etc) gave me a chance to make the project more interesting and learn new things that I wouldn’t have learned otherwise.
In some ways, I’m doing the same thing with the Knowledge Object project as a whole. We were allowed to pick pretty much any topic we wanted to, and I’ve been wanting to learn more coding skills for a while, so this gave me a good opportunity to prioritize it as part of my grad school course work. I already feel like that’s helping me to put a lot more work into this than I would have for a topic I found less stimulating. It’s certainly helped me to get myself working on the projects a lot sooner than I may have otherwise!
Whenever we have the autonomy to inject a bit of interest and autonomy into our learning projects, we help to increase our level of engagement and motivation, and usually end up learning a lot more as a result! I try to bring this into the classroom whenever possible by encouraging students to use their projects as an excuse to learn more about something they like, or to share one of their interest with the class via their projects.
Sharing and Accessibility
This weekend, I figured out how to export my Quotapalooza app as an APK file so that I could share it with a few friends who use Android devices. First, this let me share what I’ve been working on with others, which means my project has an actual audience, and won’t just sit on my computer when I’m done with it.
I also got some great feedback from a friend who pointed out that there was no way to scroll down the screen. He has the text size set larger than the default to make it easier to read, which is helpful for people with vision problems, but when the quotes got longer they pushed the button so far down that it disappeared of the screen, and he could no longer click to see new quotes.
I talk about accessibility with students a lot for a few reasons. First, anyone working in web development as a profession will have to learn how to make their work accessible in order to comply with growing regulations designed to make the web more usable for people with disabilities. People with vision-related disabilities, for example, commonly use screen readers in order to use websites, and the structure of the page has a big impact on whether or not the screen reader can make sense of the page.
Beyond the legal requirements, it’s always important to think about the people who will be using the digital products we create, and this can be a great opportunity to talk about empathy and inclusion with students within a practical, authentic context.
One of the subjects that came up during the workshops where I collaborated with a team of other educators to develop the proposed New York State Computer Science and Digital Fluency Learning Standards was the need to help students understand how their words and actions online impact real people who see the digital footprints they leave behind. Creating projects with Scratch and other tools is a great way to encourage students to get in the habit of considering this often-invisible audience with everything they design and share.
In Scratch projects, for example, you can have sprites talk by making a speech bubble appear on the screen, but also by using the Text-to-Speech extension to play audio of the same message. Including both of these ensures that people who can’t see the text (or who can’t read yet) can still follow along with the action on the screen. When building websites, we include alt text in the HTML elements for images because screen readers can read these descriptions to visitors who can’t see the pictures we’ve included.
I know one of the things that motivated me to learn to develop websites as a teenager was a desire to share things with other people, which is the same thing that motivated me to start this website to share my learning and reflections about programming and teaching. Students are often motivated by the same things, especially when they find that they can build digital games and share them with other builders. Making inclusion a part of that process can help them form good habits that will hopefully lead to a more inclusive world in the long run.
In my case, it helped me make my app better by adding scrolling functionality, and to improve my work in the future by making me aware of something new that I can test for when building future apps. It also motivated me to look up how to change my app so that you can scroll down the screen if the quote is too long to view all at once, and I know I will remember how to do that in the future!
The Greatest Teacher Failure Is
I shared one of my favorite Yoda quotes in a meme a few days ago, but this week was another opportunity to test the theory for myself.
I tell students all the time that everyone struggles with coding sometimes, even people who’ve been doing it for decades. I tell them constantly that this doesn’t mean they can’t do it, or even get really good at it! I tell them to expect frustration and not give up, because at the other end of that frustration is a feeling of accomplishment when you finally figure it out. And I tell them that the ability to struggle with it and keep learning is the most important skill a software or web developer can have!
I know in my bones that this is all true, but it sure doesn’t stop you from feeling defeated by it sometimes, when you’ve been fighting and fighting with it and don’t seem to be getting anywhere. As many times as I’ve seen it in the classroom (or experienced it first hand), you’d think that I would be more resistant to the feelings of failure and inadequacy that can creep up during those times, but I’m still not. There was a point last weekend where I really didn’t know if I’d be able to push through and finish this very, very basic Flutter app and move on with the tutorial.
To be honest, I might have given up if this weren’t a school assignment. I’m really glad that I didn’t have that option, but this reminds me of why I spend so much time building up my students’ confidence during classes. People can accomplish nearly anything when they believe that they can, but it can be so easy to believe yourself incapable, especially when it comes to the STEM fields. So many people believe that they can’t be successful in STEM fields, and struggling with every project can feel like a confirmation of that belief. It’s good to be reminded of what it feels like to be in that position so that I can speak with authenticity when my students need encouragement.
When I finished the app, though? What bliss! It made me feel so confident! I’m used to being successful in school, and I know how to develop websites, but this is an entirely different level of programming skill, and one that I’ve flirted with but never pursued in great depth. I know it’s going to get harder as I go, but for right now I can ride this wave of excitement into battle!
The Benefits of Doing it the Hard Way
I mentioned in my last post that I deliberately chose to do the first real assignment without going back to the tutorial videos immediately. Now that I’ve started on the second app in the videos (i.e., not built independently, but built following along with the instructor), I can definitely see the benefits of battling it out in this way.
Today, I was able to pause the video and write some of the code before the instructor got to it, which was very exciting! I knew how to do some of the things he hasn’t introduced yet because I figured out how to do them for the first independent assignment, and now that I’ve watched his videos on the topic, I found that I did it in the same way. As a self-described Hermione, this felt really good for me.
I definitely spent a few more hours on the Quotapalooza app than I would have if I’d just gone back and followed the videos, but I suspect I’ll get those hours back with greater familiarity with the concepts over the next few months.