Category: Uncategorized

Covering the federal election, before the election

Since PM Scott Morrison did not announce the federal election date last week, it will now be held somewhere between March and May (see the post from ABC’s Antony Green for details). Various aspects of elections are covered in the Civics & Citizenship Australian Curriculum in Years 4, 5 and 6. Students are interested in topical issues in society and their local community. After all, it’s adults making decisions now about issues that will affect them, and it students feel quite strongly that they should have a say. Guiding that process from within a classroom can be a good thing.

And regardless of what opinions we hold on particular topics, learning how the voting system works, with assistance from free additional resources by the AEC (Australian Electoral Commission), is useful and one might say essential for everyone in our society. With our Election Activity Bundle, you as a teacher (or home tutor) have everything you need to guide this learning process.

Most of the materials can be used in a remote classroom, with the appropriate PDFs and other resources made available to the students – so they are definitely usable in a COVID scenario.

While the “Show of Hands” Activity of course works fine, doing the secret ballot from the “Running a Class Election” Activity is not practical in a remote setting, and that in itself is something that can be discussed with the students, compensating for missing out on actually doing it… what are the issues there?

The activities are of course specifically aimed at the above-mentioned year levels. However, the base resources are suitable for high school students and adults as well!  Everything you wanted to know about preferences, for instance.

So, while planning the latter part of your first school term this year, grab our Election Activity Bundle today, for only $9.

School-wide Understanding Our World® implementations

Understanding Our World - integrated History/Geography HASS+Science programAre you considering implementing our integrated HASS+Science program, but getting a tad confused by the pricing?  Our subscription model didn’t not provide a So nowstraightforward calculation for a whole school or year-level.  However, it generally works out to $4.40 (inc.GST) per student.  So now we’re providing this as an option directly: implement our integrated HASS+Science program school-wide from just $4.40 per student.  Easy!

Just like with the subscriptions, we do price on the basis of at least 100 students, which means that very small schools see an effective higher cost per student compared to the above stated.  However, we’ve done a few projections and because of composite classes and the like this approach often still works out cheaper than the old subscription system.  Plus, our materials provide for multi-year integration which are a lot of work to achieve.  So you get proper solutions for your education needs, and at an unbeatable price.

Try our calculator with the numbers for your school!

QWERTY 150 years old

Did you realise that QWERTY and typewriters were from that long ago?  I certainly didn’t.  I did grow up in the late era of the typewriter (70s/80s), and I first learnt how to type on a mechanical typewriter.  It was a model with a dual-coloured ribbon (black/red) which I used to good effect for a variety of things.

I still own a “capture the flag” type card game called the Oasis game which I manufactured myself: I typed up the text for each of the cards (in the two different colours, as appropriate), cut them, and put contact on (no laminator). The game is still in pretty good shape, as it is stored in an also home-made card case.  I’ve got proof, I just took a picture of it (below).

Oasis card game by Arjen Lentz

Christopher Latham Sholes
Image credits: George Iles [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons
 

Now, back to history… in the 1860s, a politician, printer, newspaper man, and amateur inventor in Milwaukee by the name of Christopher Latham Sholes spent his free time developing various machines to make his businesses more efficient.

One such invention was an early typewriter, which he developed with Samuel W. Soulé, James Densmore, and Carlos Glidden, and first patented in 1868.  The grant date of US patent US79265A is 23 June 1868, thus today is exactly the 150 year mark.  So, happy birthday QWERTY!

Sholes typewriter, 1873
Sholes typewriter from 1873, isn’t it a beauty? (in Buffalo NY history museum)

New Mirobot v3 arrival in Australia

Here’s our batch of brand new Mirobot v3 kits on their arrival in Australia, dozens stacked. Since the v3 have a neat acrylic frame, I think I’ll do a proper “unboxing” and first build video of one soon, so you can see for yourself what this is about.

Many classes of year 5 and 6 students around Brisbane and their teachers have done our Robotics Workshops in recent years (using the Mirobot v1 and v2), and others have purchased their own Mirobot to build and use at home.  And schools around Australia order sets to run their own programs.

What’s special about the v3 is that it’s now possible to repeatedly build and (carefully) disassemble the Mirobots, which means that not only the programming but also the assembly process can be repeated for future cohorts.

Below is an animation of the v3 kit build process:

The Mirobot is a “logo” turtle: it takes a pen (up&down) and can move forward/reverse (in mm) and turn left/right (in degrees).  So, Mirobot can draw, and that’s really important because it provides students with very direct feedback for their programming.  There are also bump and line-following sensors.

Students engage with inquiry-based learning: first the build which involves learning about the components and the mechanical structure – then, programming from a “simple” square, to a house, circle, stars and much more complex patterns.  Students also make them write letters.  Sure!

Most of the current batch was already pre-ordered, but we have some regular stock.

 

Welcome Back!

Pinkerton map of Australia 1818Well, most of our schools are back, or about to start the new year. Did you know that there are schools using OpenSTEM materials in every state and territory of Australia? Our wide range of resources, especially those on Australian history, give detailed information about the history of all our states and territories. We pride ourselves on having a resource on every topic in the Australian HASS and Science curriculum for primary school, so if you find something that you think is missing, please let us know and if it’s not there already, it soon will be!

This year we are preparing a new suite of Understanding Our World® HASS + Science Units for anyone who wants a bit of variety. If you are interested, do let us know and we might even be able to give you a sneak preview. Remember, all our Understanding Our World units run for 9 weeks per term, giving a bit of leeway for those crazy early weeks of the year!

There will also be some new resources coming out, and some substantial updates to some more familiar resources. Much of our material has been updated for the new year already, so make sure that you update your copies, especially with the 2018 licensed material.

Diced Maths® Number Reach™ logoLast year, after requests from some of the teachers we work with, OpenSTEM® started developing resources to assist with the Maths curriculum. Our Diced Maths® resources have been so popular that some students have even asked if they could swap from computer-based Maths programs to the Diced Maths resources! Students report that these resources make them feel more in control of their own learning and love “playing” with the funky dice. Many don’t see the activities as “doing Maths” at all. These activities develop students’ problem solving skills, whilst practising all their basic Maths concepts and operations at the same time.

Stay tuned for some exciting specials coming up in the next few weeks, as well as some more in depth exploration into a range of topics.