Tech Clubs restart for 2019

There is a growth in the number of students extending their learning through the co-curricular tech clubs being held during lunchtime and after school.  This year St Margaret's College are offering robotics, coding as well as some new clubs aimed at the upper Junior School and Middle School students.  Construction Club is designed to enlighten the brains of the girl engineers.  Students developing their skills in the Construction Club will get an opportunity to enter the EPRO8 Challenge later on in the year.
We also hope to introduce a Minecraft club starting in term 2.  Planning for this club is well underway and will be student facilitated with Audrey Campbell mentoring these student leaders.
Robotics for year 4 - 13 continues to show keen interest.  Girls working on coding and creating their robots will get a chance to enter Robocup competing against other students in rescue, theatre or soccer. 
Since the introduction of our code club in 2015, we have steadily built on the number of girls getting involved.  We now have girls from other schools participating in our code clubs.  There are three levels of coding.  Our beginners learn Scratch, Intermediate coders are working with Python and our advanced coders are grappling with C++ and creating projects of personal interest.

Making Maths Fun

Middle School Maths

Making Maths fun and modifying the context in which children are using their numeracy skills is something that Nicole has introduced to her class this year.  Nicole has engaged her students by creating a number of variables that can be manipulated to challenge students. She has used the idea of the dartboard and the areas where the score is doubled and tripled.  Velcro balls act as the 'darts' and students throw the ball at the wall that starts the calculations.  The first activity today has been to double or triple the outer number, then adding all the numbers together.  Functions can vary, as can the numbers around the outside of the target.  "Triple Tuesday" will run as a regular activity in Maths.