5YL - VISIT TO ORT UNIVERSITY
The aim of this trip was to have our students to experience “one day as a University student” in the ORT University and apply Computer Science skills outside the classroom.
Programming teachers and other staff planned a whole activity for our students to go to the IT labs over there and program so as to have a working app in 2 hours. This was achieved with MIT App Inventor which is similar to Scratch, a tool taught in IT classes at our School. In the IT labs every student had a computer and an Android tablet with all the needed software already installed and running. Some students worked in pairs while some others preferred to work alone.
The whole activity was a pleasure to observe, since every single student was fully concentrated on the task and as time went by, they could see the results of their apps working on their tablets.
By the end of the course, they were all handed copies of the steps needed to do re-do those apps that they created throughout the course, a notebook, pens and a brochure with information about the available careers of the University.
At the end of the day every single person who was with us at the University congratulated them on their behaviour and dedication. They were all very concentrated the whole time, working with real joy and they all finished the course very proud of themselves too.
Agustina Sapelli - Computer Science teacher
Some comments by our students:
"Visiting the ORT was a great experience, we had the possibility to receive an insight on how to create a video game and the university itself, in my experience, it was very useful since I was always extremely interested in game designing, and I had the pleasure of learning how to in an extremely exciting and fun way. In addition, the helpers were very nice and that presented a very nice environment. This particular university is my number one preference for my college experience, I just wanted to go because of experiences and perspectives from my family and friends, but this field trip affirmed my wishes. Regarding the learning experience, I found it very exciting due to the fact that while carrying out all the technical part, we thought to ourselves that an amazing result will be presented to us, a good result from hard work. However I found it genuinely easy to carry out since, we had all the instruction given to us in a paper, what I found interesting was how we got used to all the buttons and the layout of the page, while we kept on practicing. All in all, I could say that this field trip was personally very useful but at the same time extremely thrilling and fun." MARÍA TORRENDELL
"The trip was really good, it was fun learning more about computing and programing. The games we played that were to make a programs and try them on the tablet were a really good idea, me and my friend that were together really enjoyed it. The part I liked the most was when we had to make a program about drawing, it was not easy but I liked it. I'm still confused if that is the type of programing you do in the ORT or if it was just a game. One thing I would do to make the trip better next time would be the waiting time at the lobby." LUCAS VILLARONGA
"Personally, I really enjoyed the trip we did with the whole computer science group. I believe it was an instance to know more about what computer engineering and computer science is about and the different applications that can be created with multiple function. As I will be doing computer engineering, I liked the trip a lot, although I must say that the final 30 minutes were a bit too extensive and continuing with the same type of exercises was quite tiering. Nevertheless, if another instance like this was done I would be happy to attend, and maybe sometimes leaving the class with your group helps you get along better together, as well as free our mind from all the stress from school." ANDREW RONALD COOPER
