(Jun 10 to 14, 2019)

               When I was informed in my classroom that I would take a coding and robotics course at the HCC. I had been motivating sixth grade girls to participate in the Houston area for two years with EV3 and KIPR LINK robots. When I got to HCC, I received an iPad and an Apple Pencil 1st Generation. My knowledge in apple technology was basic. There were participants from various districts, universities, colleges, and the apple company. It was a super intimidating and stressful day to me. What I heard at the tables were teachers who worked in schools with technology. Dr. Tilisa Thibodeaux from Lamar University spoke about a learning manifesto, ePortafolios, and a blackboard platform. Other presenters also talked about the subject and I still could not understand what the central objective of what was being talked about was. They all started setting up the Blackboard and the ePortafolio.  Elementary, middle and high school groups were created and we started doing activities using iPads. In all of them, I always stayed behind because, I needed to learn from the basics. I stayed until two a.m. in the morning reviewing what I had seen during the day and practicing for the next day. Most of the participants had experience with Spheros, Swift playground, Apps Prototypes. For me everything was new, I had to ask almost everything. Groups were formed to carry out an App Prototype. Our group created one for Memorial Assistance Ministries–MAM in Houston. It was very exciting and productive group work. I continued in the summer exploring and practicing daily what was done in those five days.

 

(July 29 to August 1, 2019)

               During these four days, in the summer camp “CAMP CODE 2019” with Middle School students I was already familiar and prepared with each lesson. Only three (25%) of the invited students participated and it was a very positive experience. Students had a lot of fun and worked hard. Allowing me to observe and analyze the trends of the participants. Our school of 770 students, unfortunately, has a low percentage of participation in robotics and coding both within the school and in the Houston area. It is an important topic to reflect and analyze the reasons and what needs to be done in school to improve in those areas. Our students have a lot of potential for coding and robotics. During August, I was reviewing literature on robotic’s clubs and strategies to motivate the participation of middle school students.

 

(September 3, 2019)

               “Techies Club” started with 5 participants who met Tuesday and Thursday from 3:30 pm to 5:30 p.m. with concepts of collaborative learning, growth mindset, and frequent reflections. The club was driven by students and facilitator together. We discussed the big ideas and they created their own journeys and develop their growth mindsets through ePortafolios. We worked together on apps such as keynote, playground, Sphero Edu, Tips Pages, iMovie, Clips, and GarageBand.  Exploring how to integrate them. We became more versatile, more confident, and more powerful on apple apps. We started a new chapter with five strategies:

 

1) We increased the publicity in the school with posters, video ads inviting students to participate, each member talked to their friends in the hallways, cafeteria, buses, and through text messaging.

 

2) Students teach students in a collaborative learning environment where senior members and the facilitator worked one to one with the new participants.

 

3) We developed the expectations and norms for the club.

 

4) We implemented the Free Libre Open Sources - FLOS.

 

5) Community members participated on coding and robotics activities guided by the club members.

 

            With these strategies, two weeks later the club had 13 members (11 boys and 2 girls.) The new recruits followed the path of collaborative learning, growth mindset, and the same strategies. One month later (October 17th), the club had 22 members (14 boys and 8 girls). I continue learning from each member’s trends, styles, and expectations. I guided them when they asked for advice. During the first five minutes on each session, we met and reflected on the importance of challenging themselves; of seeing mistakes as opportunities to learn; of creating a collaborative environment, and teaching others. Learners took the FLOS list and created their own agenda for each session. Students frequently volunteer to teach members of the community to code and use robots in the club. I was motivating and observing them. While I continue learning from student’s growth mindsets.

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(Nov 7 to 10, 2019)

               The Apple Community Education Initiatives (Leadership and Learning Academic 2019) in Phoenix, Arizona was the most important and motivational event in this journey. I learned many things on creativity lab; discover schoolwork; engaging the community through outdoor investigations; app development pathway; and creating broadcast sessions. The speech of Ray Zahab and Sady Paulson were powerful and inspired me to motivate Techies Club members to continue developing their growth mindset and mine. The showcases were so impressive because of their creativity and innovation. I showed videos of the app prototypes event to the Techies Club members.  Some students were already working on their own app prototypes and this motivated other students to create prototypes apps. This event was astonishing for me.

 

(November 19, 2019 to March 13, 2020)

               The club continue receiving new members and we continue working hard to prepare the apps showcases and projects for the family night during the month of May, 2020. I continue developing my growth mindset with the Techies club and through the Concepts of Educational Technology” of Lamar University. I learned with Dr. Tilisa Thibodeaux, Dr. Dwayne Harapnuik and Mike Yakubovsky the most important knowledge of constructivism, connectivism, and cognitivism theories; the effectiveness of developing a growth mindset on learners; and the importance to create an authentic learning environment. Not only for my students, but also for myself and my family as well. This amazing experience with Lamar University allowed me to reflect about my beliefs on traditional education. I felt free to express on the ePortafolio my point of view about our education system regarding students from disadvantage communities and the importance of digital learning education to help cut the poverty cycle.

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(March 23, 2020 to April 4, 2021 - COVID19 crisis. More than a year)

                This difficult time changed the dynamics of our life. I communicated weekly with 90 families from my Title I school and I knew the stress, the frustration on those families, and the panic, especially on recent immigrants. Schools, students, and families were not prepare for distance digital education. On the positive side of this situation, families were more involved on their own children’s education. Teachers that avoided the use of technology in their classrooms were force to learn and use technology for distance education. Students were required to use daily technology, organize their time, and learn in different ways with no teacher close to them. This coronavirus crisis created new opportunities to learn, share information, and empower the connectivism theory of George Siemens and Stephen Downes. We need to learn how to teach online and engage students with meaningful connections to real life.   The challenge of distance learning education is to create relevant and attractive lessons to engage middle school students and compete against videos games and media. My journey in the initiative of Lamar University, HCC, and Apple allowed me to be more prepared for this crisis and I was able to implement the knowledge that I acquired during this year.  I continue to encourage and motivate Techies club members through zoom. The club members are working on coding with Tynker app. I am better teacher now with this experience than what I was a year ago. I proved through Techies Club that, the participation of students in technology clubs is robust and directly proportional to the effectivity of the strategies used in engaging them to join and continue. Also, that our title I students have the potential to learn, they only need the opportunities, the tools, and the authentic environment to succeed.