Hour of Code

In 2013, Code.org launched the “Hour of Code Challenge” on its website to teach computer science to school students, enticing them to complete short programming tutorials. It involved getting people to write short snippets of code. About 20 million people participated and over 600 million lines of code had been written. By October 2014, about forty million students had taken the Hour of Code class, and a second Hour of Code was held in December 2014.

York House participated in the Hour of Code on December 4th. On that day, students in all classes worked on a variety of different coding projects. Scratch Jr., Robot Turtles, Beebot, and re-designing a Google logo on Scratch were just a few of the activities. Coding and computing skills are a critical path to security and prosperity in today’s job market. We really want our girls to be passionate as they learn how to use technology to solve problems in their day-to-day lives and make a positive impact on the world. Learning the basics of coding and participating in the Hour of Code teaches a highly valued skill and is also incredibly fun!

Charmalee Kirk
Education Technology Coordinator

 

YHS Students Take Virtual Field Trip with Google Expeditions

On March 30, 2016, YHS hosted Google Expedition Trainers. Many of our Junior School and Senior School classes had the opportunity to experience Google’s latest virtual reality technology. Students who participated were able to visit places all over the world without leaving the classroom.

Our teachers had a choice from a list of over 230 expeditions to enhance classroom learning. Expeditions selected included “Biomes”, “Life in the North: Churchill, Manitoba”, “Versailles”, “Life of a Robot”, “Ocean Safari”, “Out of Syria: Back into School” and “Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum”. Here are some of our Grade 3s and a Grade 7 French class trying out the technology.

Watch this overview video to learn more about Google Expeditions.