The Case for Summer Tech Camps

#techmaker18 summer boot camp is a wrap. What a week. 100 kids learned about Ozobots, conductive thread, Bloxels, Alexa programming, Makey-Makeys, Scratch, 3D printing, plant DNA extraction, HTML coding, forensics science, Cricut signs, wave machines, buoyancy engineering, guitar petal programming, scribble machines, Microbits, and much more. At the Friday Finale dinner where we showcase the kids weekly work, one little girl gave us the best compliment ever: "Can you do this for us the whole summer?" These kids want to learn, want to engage, and are over the moon about technology and applied learning. Even some of the older kids who were arm-twisted into coming begrudgingly admitted they had fun. 

Public schools should seriously consider sponsoring these tech camps throughout the summer months. There is clearly an interest and a case for filling the otherwise vacuous three summer months with rotating tech camps. Granted, there is an expense and a tremendous amount of preparation and organization, but what the kids demonstrated is that they are interested, engaged, and hungry to learn. The key, as we saw all week, is Active, Authentic Learning Opportunities. The most successful of the rotating workshops engaged the kids in hands-on activities. Competition among them also played role. When grouped into teams for the Penny Boat Engineering Challenge, the kids were excitedly vying to see who could adapt a 3D boat that would hold the most pennies using nothing but straws, rubber bands, balloons, and paper clips. (The winning team loaded 145 pennies!) 

The winning Penny Boat Challenge design held 145 pennies

Another popular activity was the WSU-Tech Future Maker Mobile Learning Lab where they showed the kids virtual welding, virtual painting, riveting, and augmented reality using a technology called ZSpace.

Inside the Future Maker Mobile Learning Lab

But by far, the most popular activity were the Ozobots. These small computers are designed to "follow" special pen trails on paper. Kids can craft their own trails that the Ozobots can follow. Older kids can navigate an Ozobot through a Lego obstacle course that is controlled by an Ozobot app.

Ozobots in Action

This tech camp was open to kids from 4th grade through 9th grade. Despite the wide age range, the kids all stayed focused and engaged throughout the long days (five 1.25 hour workshops) and week (four consecutive days).