children get acquainted with technology

Fontys Information and Communication Technology

Primary school children get acquainted with technology

On Friday 9 June colleagues Iris Soute and Lennart de Graaf visited OBS Ekenrooi in Waalre. Iris was familiar with the school, because her children attend it. Armed with a small army of Bee-bots, small robots that are easy to program, they taught 3rd grade kids the basics of programming. 

The visit was part of a larger plan to offer FH-ICT colleagues the opportunity to shape the technology lessons at the schools of their children while at the same time showing what their children's moms and dads are working on every day. Iris, Lennart and colleague Robin Achterberg are developing something like a ‘course package’ for any teacher to use. They are doing this in cooperation with Edubot, a non-profit organisation that develops free teaching materials for the bee-bot platform. The course package currently being developed is aimed at the youngest kids (grades 1 to 4). 

According to school teacher Sjak Stofmeel the kids mastered the programming surprisingly fast. That hardly comes as a surprise in this smart brain-port region: Indeed, talent doesn't know age. Ms Stofmeel found it challenging herself though, but she'll dig some deeper into the subject matter with the class in the coming period. She was enthusiastic about the fact that the children were working on ICT while at the same time also working on standard school subjects such as arithmetic and spelling. That means no extra work, but an exciting new way to make learning more fun for the kids. 

If you'd also like to work with ICT on a primary school in your neighbourhood, contact Lennart de Graaf.