Okay, so I got caught up in the business of holiday stuff and pandemic surge, and I forgot to post Monday. But I am continuing with making a modest weekly contribution to some classroom somewhere in this country. As I've said before, Donors Chose shouldn't be a thing because schools should be fully funded, but in the meantime, individual teachers in individual classrooms can use a hand. This is doubly true in pandemic times, when pretty much no districts are investing the extra money needed to really pull this off.
So here's a simple way to help. I'll share with you my classroom of the week, and you can help with that one, or pick another one (last time somebody followed me onto the site and funded the entire project, which was cool).
I'm doing two this week.
The first is from the school just right up the road where many of my friends teach. In this rural-ish area, robotics have really caught fire, but a lot of the emerging programs are operating on shoestring budgets. This particular elementary group needs some cases for transporting robots and equipment to competitions. I don't know this particular teacher, but I do know that these robot events are a huge amount of fun and have really allowed some students to find a niche that they might not otherwise have found.
Meanwhile, out in Kansas, a teacher would like a set of Orff instruments for his K-5 elementary school. These are a great introduction to music for young students and a way for music learning to enrich their days even if they aren't destined to become future professionals.
It's a small thing, but I'm a big believer in doing small things to make the world slightly less sucky, so as always you are invited to join me in making a small contribution in a classroom somewhere.
I'm fairly certain that the competition you are mentioning is called the BEST Robotics. This is one of th most demanding and rewarding challenges out there. Students not only build robots to meet a specific challenge related the real world of robotics, they have to develop a marketing strategy and create a booth like you would see at an expo, among other things. The timing is compressed, the rubrics are tough and the range of skills they develop is incredible. They do research, create media, make presentations to the community and the list goes on. The competitions are loud and raucous. I highly recommend supporting these kids. This is a truly effective applied learning opportunity and the memories will last a lifetime. Look it up.
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