Interesting Links 8 November 2010

  • Article

Well we are really and truly into November now. Over the weekend we went back to Eastern Standard time in New Hampshire. The best thing about that is that for a little while it is easier for me to get up earlier. Does the same effect work with students? Not sure. I have a bunch of links for teachers of any area at the end of the post but first I’ve got a couple of “weeks” to talk about. We’re less than a month away from Computer Science Education week ! What are you doing for it? If you are on twitter than besides looking through the ideas at https://www.csedweek.org/  you can also follow @CSEdWeek for news.

The second week I want to bring to your attention is National Robotics Week. Do you have students who are more interested in moving atoms than pixels? Well robotics may just be the hook to get them interested in computer science as well as all sorts of engineering disciplines. The second annual National Robotics Week will be April 9-17, 2011. Follow @roboweek on Twitter as another way to keep up with the news.

Speaking of getting students interested, Myra Deister of the Computer Science Teachers Association has a post on their blog about Recruiting students for Computer Science classes and asks “what do you do?” You  can follow CSTA on Twitter at @csteachersa BTW.

Not unrelated is this fun video: CS Is My Life on the Comp Science Woman blog. It’s great fun and the young woman who sings it is not your stereotypical weird geeky looking person either. You can also follow the people behind the Computer Science Woman blog on twitter at @compsciwoman

Speaking of videos - Can your students tell a story through video? You don’t need to be a developer to participate in the Imagine Cup Digital Media competition and there are a bunch of resources available to help get started here. 

If you are interested in how a competition like the Imagine Cup can be used in curriculum this article  about  Prof Ming Chow at Tufts University who teaches a game development course based on XNA and has students enter the Imagine Cup may be of interest – Academic Spotlight: Tufts University.

Now for some general education related links so there is something for everyone.