This term, our Inquiry is based on computational thinking. We have been learning the vocabulary to describe the position of an object using everyday language such as "left", "right" ,"quarter turn" on a grid using one step or square for each movement.
The children were given a grid to trace a possible route a bee might take to move from one position, across the page to a blue flower following the reading of a PM text "Speedy Bee". There were several possible routes that "Speedy Bee" could take but the instructions were that the bee was not allowed to fly diagonally across squares and it had to avoid the hazards. The children were asked to mark their route then describe it to a partner using everyday language.
When it came time to discuss the routes that they had drawn, I found many children had drawn a diagonal line and could not get the concept of moving on a grid using the squares. How could one quickly demonstrate this concept? I though about how the children often built with the magnetic shapes forming a grid base so I asked the children to help me build a small grid, counting the sides to make sure it was even.
Then we got out the Duplo blocks, a princess and a cupcake. The princess was to be moved across the grid to get to the cupcake and each square filled with a Duplo block to show the route she took. The blocks could not fit into the grid on the diagonal so it forced the children to fill the squares with a block and look at routes that only used forward and backward movements and quarter turns to the left or right. They quickly caught on to the directional movement and had fun exploring and trying to describe how they moved the princess across the grid.
