This is a story about students from “Vëllezërit Frashëri” school who were very concerned about the environment, recycling, and how it impacts health so they created the project to address these issues. The school started the recycling project somewhere at the end of February 2019. Teachers were asked to work together with students and find out how they could use micro:bit to make project better.
The focus was on the existing landfills, as children felt they should apply recycling methods to plastic, paper and glass instead of just letting these materials poison lands. Students envisioned that the recycled materials can be packed, classified and sorted by colour through robotics then placed to the designated area and picked up by trucks.
From March to May 2019, many students of different grades became involved in working with micro:bit. Moreover, teachers were advised to give the micro:bit to the students and ask them to explore possibilities also at home at their own pace, and come back with their ideas. It was stated that students found this approach very useful because they were free to explore and find ways of integrating micro:bit in their school project. This way, they learned a lot from each other, and every student who showed interest in coding had the chance to contribute and be an active part of the project that presented the change and innovation.
The key results of the project were more than twofold, but below are emphasised key conclusions:
- All landfills in our country and worldwide should support the idea of recycling;
- Students should be encouraged to continuously do research and explore the data for achieving better results.
Based on these results, it can be said that even after the project came to life, teachers and students of this school continued to have an impact in their school, and to a wider area. Hence, as far as the students were encouraged to continuously do research and explore the data, it shows that they have been thinking in finding new ways of improving their work on the project by making it even more efficient. They have proved this by participating also in different international coding competitions and being awarded for their innovative idea related to the sustainable development goals.
“The connection between CTPS and coding gave me the opportunity to try new strategies and techniques so that I can motivate students even more and include each one of them.”
- Albanian Language Teacher