Elementary School Program

Up to 60 students, teachers, parents and chaperones attend the three-day program which focuses on computer hardware, parallel computing, programming, and networking. The program includes:

• Carlos Lopez and Tammy Campbell, teach students how to build a computer (raspberry pi), boot it, login and navigate the computing environment
• David Jacobowitz explained how to use several lower powered computers to work in parallel to solve a bigger problem –– part of a new addition to the curriculum on parallel computing.  David built a cluster of raspberry pis and demonstrates the representation of fractals.
• Anita Newkirk and Jimmy Mai walk the students through software and programming using iPads. Using several applications, students learn the fundamentals of programming including repeats and loops.
• Nat Stoddard and Chris Harwood provide a general overview of networking and have the students carry packets (poster pieces in manila envelopes with and invisible characters stamped on outside) from a source location to a “router” (a black light box where the invisible symbol is revealed) onto the destination location (table designated by a symbol). Student then open every packet to reveal poster pieces. They then reassemble the pieces into a poster to reveal the picture.

The program has received positive comments from parent surveyed, such as “thanks for all the efforts. I think it’s great for the kids to get all this exposure to computers and programming” and “thanks for introducing our public schools to all of these concepts and resources!!”

Additional volunteers come from other groups in the IT Division and the organizers couldn’t have the program without their efforts.

Parent & Teacher Information