SFUSD’s K-2 Creative Computing curriculum introduces computer science as a creative, collaborative, and engaging discipline to children in kindergarten through second grade.
Across 3 units and 15-20 lessons, students will learn about algorithms and programming, computing systems, the Internet, and impacts of computing, while developing strong practices and dispositions. Lessons are designed to be implemented in 45 to 60-minute periods approximately once per week.
In Unit 1, students will be introduced to computer science through creating simple algorithms of everyday real-life tasks and playing a game to navigate a robotic dog. If time allows, students will also learn about the need for writing precise instructions by algorithms for drawing crazy characters.
Sequence of Lessons
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- Lesson 1: Real-Life Algorithms
- Lesson 2: Rosie’s Runtime (1 – 2 periods)
- Lesson 3: Crazy Character Algorithms (optional)
In Unit 2, students use Bee-Bot, a robot designed for use by young children. The colorful, easy-to-operate, and friendly little robot is a perfect tool for teaching sequencing, estimation, problem-solving, and just having fun! It was inspired by Seymour Papert’s robot turtles and LOGO programming language.
In this unit, students will learn to program Bee-Bots using sequences of simple commands. By doing so, they will gain fluency with planning, testing, and debugging programs of increasing complexity.
The lessons were designed to support groups of about 4 students per Bee-Bot.
Sequence of Lessons
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- Lesson 4: Bee-Bot Basics
- Lesson 5: Debugging (1 – 2 periods)
- Lesson 6: Drawing Numbers
- Lesson 7: Shapes, Color, and Size
- Lesson 8: Spelling Words (optional)
- Lesson 9: Decomposition & Maze (1 – 2 periods, optional)
Unit 3 uses ScratchJr, which is a developmentally appropriate programming language designed specifically for children aged five through seven by teams at Tufts University and MIT. Using the ScratchJr app, children can create their own interactive collages, animated stories, games, and other programs.
In this unit, which can be further divided into two modules, students will learn a series of concepts and skills that are applied in two primary creative projects — an interactive collage and an animated story. Through these lessons, students will learn how to express their own ideas in a way that a computer can understand.
These lessons were designed to support students working individually and in pairs, with 1-2 tablets per pair.
Sequence of Lessons
Module 1: Interactive Collage
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- Lesson 10: Dance Party
- Lesson 11: More Moves
- Lesson 12: The Big Event
- Lesson 13: Old Macdonald’s Farm
Module 2: Animated Story
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- Lesson 14: Change the Pace
- Lesson 15: Getting Loopy
- Lesson 16: School Story
- Lesson 17: Build a Snowman (optional)
- Lesson 18: The Tortoise and Hare (1 – 2 periods, optional)
- Lesson 19: Animation Project: Part 1 (1 – 2 periods)
- Lesson 20: Animation Project: Part 2
Source and Attributions: All Images, Text and Content Created by the San Francisco Unified School District (SFUSD) Computer Science team: CSinSF.org.