Educator Workshops: Building Teachers Confidence in STEM Concepts

This Monday -the 19th- marks the start of the Educator Workshops week here at theCO. Christen Harper, the tech education coordinator for Dev Catalyst has four days planned for new teachers who may be interested in getting Dev Catalyst in their own school as well as teachers who already use the program and are ready to tune themselves up before the start of the school year. 

These workshops are a powerful tool, “It's really rewarding to see a teacher who feels a little in over their heads and come out with a really good grasp on the material.” Christen tells me, “Bring the attitude you want your own students to have inside the classroom and you’ll be able to really take advantage of all that the workshops we have to offer.” Getting to be around seasoned educators and hear their tips and tricks for the classroom is another huge benefit, The teachers who have been through the program before offer some great insight to those who are new.  

When you sign up for the workshops, you can pick and choose which parts you’d like to attend. If you’ve been interested in learning more about the program, day one is a perfect place to start. Christen goes over all the information regarding the Dev Catalyst program, the online learning platform and tech competition plus opportunities for students & teachers here at theCO.

For the rest of the week, each day is broken up into two halves based on your level. Tuesday, Level 1 focuses on getting started in web development, walks you through the world of programming languages, editors and basic web development code as Christen teaches you to build your own website. The second half of the day (Level 2) is based on taking your website to the next level. This is geared toward teachers with a good grasp of HTML and CSS, and are ready to learn slightly more advanced concepts of CSS and JavaScript to better support their students.

Day three is centered around Raspberry Pi, the first level being a great introductory course into the programming language Python and is geared toward beginners. The second level focuses on getting students to engage with and build electronics with the system. 

The last day of the workshop talks about data development, Christen will walk you through how website development changes when you’re dealing with user data, with the second half being a direct continuation of the beginning part of the day. 

There is so much these workshops cover, it is an incredible resource to teachers who are familiar with DevCat and those who aren't. “The best DevCat teachers aren’t the ones who are the most technical necessarily, “ Christen says, “it’s the ones who want their students to succeed.” These workshops definitely set the framework for the success of the program. If you’re interested in signing up, you can join the workshops at devcatalyst.com/workshops.