Posts on Moorlag's Blog

Hugo Handson

Mon, 15 Aug 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Thoughts on HugoConf

In a few words, HugoConf was like living in the future. A future without the need for database-driven websites and pushing technology like it was/wasn’t intended. I enjoy the niece communities a lot. It’s inspiring to see how quick a new culture is created in the chatbox and interact with the speakers. The bees in the chat and adopting a Bee as a mascot was fun. Humble the Hugo Bee was born in the chatbox.

There was a program filled with over 30 speakers. From lightning talks to in-depth sessions. Steve Francia, founder of Hugo was a great speaker. Seeing how it was developed as a new (and fast) blog system is inspiring. Quick and easy. I enjoyed the session of Joost van der Schee; automatically resizing and compression images in a Hugo site.

This was a great conf, well organized and managed. And thanks for the stickers!

Resources

Todo

Adding Image gallery to my blog.

Random Hack of Chrome Dino

Thu, 14 Jul 2022 00:00:00 +0000

The random things I find online

Ever played the Dino game when Chrome (thinks) it’s offline? With this ‘hack’ you can enter God Mode, literally. The Dino will fly in the sky. And with an insert tag we can even add wings to REX :-)

Fun little project for the introduction of Computer Science for our new students (age 12-13 yrs).

Source

1- open chrome://dino/
]
2- open chrome's dev tools

3- In the console type Runner().tRex.groundYPos = 10; // to make the Dino be higher than obstacles

4- In the console Runner().setSpeed(10); // to make the Dino move faster

5- the following is to add the wings gif:

t.insertAdjacentHTML('beforebegin', `<img id="wings" src="https://i.pinimg.com/originals/2f/c4/16/2fc416822216737270f1566324e5c1b3.gif" />

<style> #wings { width: 45px; position: absolute; top: 250px; z-index: 10; left: 23px; </style>

`);

Final projects Computer Science

Wed, 15 Jun 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Final projects

This week my students graduated from computer science. These are a few pictures of of the projects. Later I’m planning an article about how to structure a final project. With a few guidelines and best practices.

SENSE

This project is a repurposed Nerfgun with a HuskeyLens to target students that are late in my classroom. The Nerf gun has received a chip upgrade and fires +/- 25-30% harder than a stock Nerf gun. With the Stepper motor at the bottom, the weapon has over 120 degrees of freedom. It can follow students. One of the challenges was that the weapon barrel would turn and stop abruptly. With some nifty timing, the barrel speeds up and slows down to prevent swaying. Face tracking is all offline and with no ‘call home functionality.’ The teacher is allowed to be late, so everyone who enters the room after the buzzer is late. One issue is recognizing students by name, so the teacher doesn’t need to take inventory of latecomers. Another problem is adding other members of staff to the authorized person list.

And with that said, we had a good talk about building autonomous weapons.

Badger

Sun, 03 Apr 2022 00:00:00 +0000

To be updated with hacks, quick tutorials and other useful usecases with 🦡🦡🦡🦡🍄🍄🐍

Introduction BadgerOS

Here is where the funs starts to happen. It’s always a pleasure working with a product developed by Pimoroni. The documentation is always up to standards and the examples just work. In this example for a conference badge it’s an easy 1 minute coding session to customise the badge. In the build-in BadgerOS there are a few working examples.

BADGE.PY

Badge is a functional Badge for conferences and a great conversation starter. It comes with a build-in txt file that can be used updated without a lot of programming experience. Adding a personal touch with a picture needs a little skill with the command prompt. This was very helpfull.

The name badge image needs to be named ‘badge-image.bin’ and in the root directory of your Badger alongside badge.txt (not in the /images directory) !! This image needs to be exactly 104 pixels in width and 128 pixels in height so you’ll need to resize it with a graphics program like GIMP before you run it through the conversion script. When you come to convert it, don’t use the –resize flag as this will stretch it to 296 x 128, instead use python3 convert.py –binary badge-image.png

Other examples include

Checklist With a small check if you cleared the item.
Clock Sadly not the best usecase for an e-paper display. With an update cycle of half a second it flashes a lot.
E-Book Fun to read a book (or small note) on a screen the size of a business card :-)
Fonts Example fonts on the device
Image
QR gen
Launcher

The name badge image needs to be named ‘badge-image.bin’ and in the root directory of your Badger alongside badge.txt (not in the /images directory) !! This image needs to be exactly 104 pixels in width and 128 pixels in height so you’ll need to resize it with a graphics program like GIMP before you run it through the conversion script. When you come to convert it, don’t use the –resize flag as this will stretch it to 296 x 128, instead use python3 convert.py –binary badge-image.png #A hackable, programmable badge with E Ink® display, powered by Raspberry Pi RP2040.

In honour of Raspberry Pi’s 10th birthday, we’ve fused a RP2040 microcontroller with an EPD display to make a stylishly monochrome, maker friendly, e-paper badge(r) to attach to your person, your office door or to prop up on your desk. With the support of the fun guys (and gals and non-binary pals) at Ineltek and Raspberry Pi we’ve been able to keep it as low cost as possible, hoorah!

We’ve equipped Badger 2040 with plenty of buttons so you can easily change what’s displayed on the screen, a slot so you can clip it onto a lanyard and a battery connector so you can keep things portable and refresh the screen whilst on the go. On the back, you’ll find some funky badgerpunk stylings plus our RP2040 accoutrements of choice: boot and reset buttons and a Qw/ST connector so it’s super easy to plug in Qwiic or STEMMA QT breakouts

Here are some things you could do with it!

Switch between images, pronouns or secret identities at the push of a button
Make yourself into a mobile weather station or air quality monitor (by adding a sensor breakout)
Store important QR codes for getting into places (or to Rickroll people)
Make a tiny to-do list and tick stuff off
Display inspirational badger quotes or educational badger facts of the day
Want to show your Badger the world? We’ve put together a convenient Badger + Accessory Kit which contains batteries, a lanyard and everything else that’s needed to get portabello.

p.s. 🦡🦡🦡🦡🍄🍄🐍

Cloudflare and SSH

Thu, 17 Mar 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Look at the small lock in the address bar. This site is now connected via HTTPS :-)

Inky pHat and Raspberry Pi. 5 How To Tips And Tricks Automate Weather Reports.

Sun, 06 Dec 2020 00:00:00 +0000

For the annual i&i-conference, I try to find a ’new’ gadget for speakers and board members. Last year we bought Inky Phats with a Raspberry Pi Zero W. To be used as interactive name badges. A great success! In this article, I’ll share 5 tips on using the display, and I’ll be discussing a few problems. Inky pHat is an e-paper display with a dedicated controller in the PCB. Plug and play! And big thanks for the excellent documentation @Pimoroni!

Inky pHat by Pimoroni is easy to use ‘phat’ A HAT is an extension for the Raspberry Pi platform. Hardware attached on top or HAT. With the sturdy HAT construction, there a three benefits;

No soldering; plug it onto the Raspberry Pi.
Robust mechanical design, it can handle a school environment.
‘Autoconfiguration,’ all the software is provided. Just attached and install. ‘Plug and play/pray.’

I am thrilled with the HAT-system. It just works, no tinkering and no failure with a faulty connection. The design can handle some rough handling (always be careful when handling hardware!), and with the software backend from the manufacture, it’s just a few commands in the CLI, and it works. Most of the times ;-)

Tip 1 how to update Raspberry Pi

It’s always good to work with an updated Raspberry Pi. Sudo apt-get update, sudo apt-get upgrade. It will take some time when this is the first time you are using their commands. Keep in mind; these commands are going to be typed into the terminal or SSH. To keep things organized, I always end the update sessions with sudo apt-get autoclean. This removes all the no longer used files after an update.

Tip 2 Please use a stable power supply

It sounds like a normal thing to do, right… but I found out the hard way that this needs some TCL. The Raspberry Pi was giving strange errors, rebooted, and shutdown for no apparent reason. The installation on the sd-card went corrupt, and I couldn’t find the problem. I swapped the card, reinstalled the OS on the card, and even swapped Raspberry Pis. And with some deduction, Sherlock would be proud; I discovered a faulty power supply to be the problem. Double-check the quality of the Micro USB cable! And be careful when installing the Inky pHat. The pins of the Raspberry Pi and Inky pHat need to be aligned. DO-NOT-FORCE.

Tip 3 How to install software with CLI

The documentation by Pimoroni is excellent. Getting Started With Inky pHat is a great start. It helps with the correct commands for the CLI. Again, this display is a command-line interface only. It’s a quick installation with a few commandos. I’ve summarized the commands under this text block. The dollar ($) sign is a new line on the CLI. Keep in mind; this is a United Kindom based company. And over there, color is spelled with ‘ou.’ ;-).

$ curl https://get.pimoroni.com/inky | bash
$ cd /home/pi/Pimoroni/inky/examples
$ python name-badge.py --type "auto" --colour "red" --name "Ramon"

Tip 4 Automate the sh*t with CRON

CRON is the automation tool in Linux. It’s ’easy’ to use. I had a few challenges when I wanted to automate the update of the display. CRON was for me. I never used it. This resource helped me a lot! I started with calling the python script directly from CRON. After a few failures, I found that CRON does understand .sh scripts. This is my .sh script. I called it phat.sh. Open a new file with nano phat.sh. Be in the root of your folders; cd is the command to return to the root. Exit nano with ctrl+x and save (!) the file. After saving, make the file executable. Type in the same folder as the phat.sh : chmod +x phat.sh

#!/bin/bash
cd /home/pi/Pimoroni/inky/examples/phat/
python weather-phat.py --colour red

In the CRON tab, I added the following. The /10 executes the script every 10 minutes (starting at .0 every hour)—only between 8 and 22 hrs. The bash is used to run the script. Pay attention to the absolute path with a / at the beginning.

*/10 8-22 * * * * bash /home/pi/phat.sh

Tip 5 This works, what’s next?

And how what? You have a mobile weather station. It runs from a power bank or even a dedicated battery. I’m going to install it on the fridge with a micro USB cable to provide power. With the 10-minute update cycle, the screen isn’t heavily used and will work for quite some time. Inky Phat is a fun display. The use cases are immense, and I am slowly figuring out what else I can build with it.

Secret Santa in 15 minutes? Unlock Your Inner Mailninja with YAMM!

Sat, 05 Dec 2020 00:00:00 +0000

In this blog, I’ll share some insights and tips when I organized Secret Santa. Sounds easy, doesn’t it. Organizing Secret Santa with only superpowers. With my blog, I hope you can also use the superpowers I used to organize Secret Santa in 15 minutes. First I used Google Forms. This was a major thing. What information is helpful and gives a nice insight into the ‘giftee’? With this experiment, I tried my first Add-On, and we are now in love. Add-ons make dull-tasks fun! (… or at least simpeler)

The Secret Santa questions I used

Name (yes, you need to ask)
Email
What makes you happy?
What is your favorite color? (in a selection list)
What is your lucky number?
What is the maiden name of your mother (ow, wait this isn’t a credit card hacking scam)
How would you rate 2020?

And then? How can I used the earlier mentioned Super Powers With YAMM?

With that list (pro-tip export it to a sheet) the fun starts. I used YAMM (Yet-another-Mail-Merge), free of usage with 50 mailmerges/day. Like any decent Mail-Merger, it used the first line as a guide. So the list is now used as a data collection; keep the titles simple; name, email, happy, color, number, 2020. I used the documentation a lot. An excellent example of good documentation. There are free themed email templates! And now the fun continues. Do not only provide the ‘gifter’ with the data of the ‘giftee’. Provide examples of gifts, suggestions for poems/nice letters and don’t be afraid to write an example Haiku :-)

The « » are the placeholders for the titles from the first line from the Sheet. «User_Name» here is used. Notice the camelbacks; the Two Capitals? Be very consequent with capitals! Via Add-Ons in the Sheet. Easy right?

Add ‘Add-ons’

Example template - free to use -

These are tips to be an Email ninja

Select a themed email template
Double-check before sending
Track (!) opening rates. So we can nudge non-openers
Provide shops links
And repeat the suggested amount of money per gift
Nudge, repeat, rinse repeat
Provide an optional unboxing party.

Quick video to install YAMM

AxiDraw & Snap!cloud, een gouden combinatie?!

Sun, 22 Nov 2020 00:00:00 +0000

Ga er maar aan staan, een snelle handleiding over AxiDraw is er niet. Het gebruik ervan is bedriegelijk eenvoudig en tegelijkertijd bijzonder complex. Toch probeer ik een ‘ga aan de slag!’ te schrijven.

AxiDraw promo video

AxiDraw

Een aantal zaken zijn van belang. Een SVG (meer info) is hét bestandsformaat waar je het meeste mee kunt. Het is een 2d-vector formaat en dat levert door de schaalbaarheid voordelen op. In het voorbeeld kun je ook zien wat het verschil is tussen een SVG en een PNG bestand. De PNG wordt door interpretatie van Inkscape opgesplit in losse pixels. De SVG levert doordat het een vectortekening is directe lijnen op.

Snap

Snap! kan eenvoudig bijhouden hoe een tekening getekend wordt. Doe dit via settings -> log pen vector. Daarna kun je een vector (SVG) dowloaden.

Log pen vectors aanvinken, daarna rechtsonderin via Stage en rechtermuisknop export -> SVG

Onderstaande voorbeeld komt uit de example directory van Snap!.

Boven een SVG, onder een PNG

BETT 2019, vooral meer van hetzelfde ?

Sun, 14 Apr 2019 00:00:00 +0000

In Dutch, sorry folks! Also published in Vives!

Wat is BETT?

De 35e Bett show werd dit jaar voor de zevende keer gehouden in de ExCel hallen in Londen. De afkorting Bett staat voor British Educational Training and Technology Show. Jaarlijks bezoeken ongeveer 35.000 belangstellenden uit 113 landen deze ICT beurs. Onder de 850 aanwezige bedrijven bevinden zich ruim 100 startups. Nagenoeg alle aanwezige standhouders richten zich op onderwijs en ICT. Voor bezoekers is de BETT show gratis.

Aandachtspunten!

Voor een gedegen bezoek aan de Bett moet men twee dagen uittrekken. Ook dan kan men onmogelijk alle stands en lezingen bezoeken.
Bett is wereldwijd een van de toonaangevende onderwijsbeurzen, vandaar dat diverse landen er vertegenwoordigd zijn. Kritiek is er ook, zo stelde Pi-Top voorman Graham Brown-Martin in een blog dat er veel materiaal over de schutting in het onderwijs wordt geworpen.

Waarom zou je naar London gaan?

Als budget en tijd het toelaten is een bezoek aan dit grote ICT evenement zeker aan te raden. Commercie, onderwijs en gadgets worden zo prettig mogelijk gepresenteerd, waardoor er ook een zekere amusementswaarde is. Niet voor niets wordt dit evenement dan ook een show genoemd. De internationale Bettshow is vooral op het gebied van onderwijsontwikkeling in wereldperspectief trend aangevend. Volgens Rachel Brodie, verantwoordelijke voor de content en inrichting van de beurs draait het op dit moment om “collaboration spaces and active learning rooms”. Opvallend daarbij is dat men graag zoveel mogelijk controle over de zelfstandig werkende leerling wil houden.

Het internationale perspectief is zeker de moeite waar. Ondanks de mooie praatjes van standhouders is het bijzonder interessant om te zien hoe graag de meest onverwachte landen met moderne kennistechnologie mee willen doen.

Lange tijd zijn wij dan ook blijven hangen bij de stand van de Verenigde Arabische Emiraten. Een golfstaat waar de inwoners geen belasting hoeven te betalen. Ons oog was gevallen op een door de emiraten omhelst microcontrollerbordje. Een spannende film op de achtergrond liet zien hoe je onder andere je eigen op afstand bedienbare tank kunt maken. Nieuwsgierig geworden naar het curriculum vroegen wij daarnaar bij een medewerkster; deze was zeer terughoudend en verwees ons naar de curriculum specialist, ene meneer Salem Almansori, die mij echter weer naar de media adviseur Samr Al Marzooqi doorstuurde. De laatste wilde toestemming van een aanwezige staatssecretaris hebben. Deze was in gesprek en we zouden gebeld worden, hetgeen niet gebeurde. Deze grootste en mooiste stand van de beurs bleek een onneembare vesting.

Anders was dat bij de Egyptische stand, een aardige en zeer welwillende dame. Zij vertegenwoordigde de “MOET”, het ministerie voor educatie en technische educatie. Teachers First is een programma waarmee men leraren probeert te professionaliseren op het gebied van, zoals men dat daar noemt, een lerende samenleving. Voor deze ontwikkeling heeft men 10.000 leraren (de top van de piramide genoemd) uitgekozen om 1 miljoen leerlingen binnen 18 maanden te bereiken. Leerlingen die zich voorbereiden op de moderne samenleving. Het lijkt ons interessant om over een jaar de resultaten eens te bekijken, de 18 maanden zijn dan al verstreken.

Naast de Arabische kastelen nemen de Aziatische vertegenwoordigers een bescheidener plek in. Het zijn veelal stands die hun technologie baseren op Arduino, Raspberry PI en de Micro:bit.
Vooral de BBC Micro:Bit, ontwikkeld voor het computeronderwijs in het Verenigd Koninkrijk, kwam prominent aan bod. Op het bordje ter grote van een creditcard zit een ARM Cortex-M0 processor, versnellingsmeter, kompas-sensor, een display bestaande uit 25 LED’s, twee programmeerbare knoppen, 23 uit- en ingangen, Bluetooth een USB aansluiting.
Dit in 2016 op iedere Engelse school geleverde kaartje is vooral geschikt voor STEAM en coding. STEAM is een afkorting van Science Technology Engineering Art Mathematics; om de nadruk te leggen op informatie technologie wordt de letter “A” vaak weggelaten en spreekt men over STEM.
STEAM of STEM stands zijn volop aanwezig, zo waren er heel wat startups die op basis van het Micro:Bit kaartje een educatief bedrijf zijn begonnen. Helaas was er erg veel “meer van hetzelfde”, zo liet een tiental stands het bekende autootje over de zwarte lijn rijden en hadden ze hooguit nog een of twee andere producten in de aanbieding.

Chinese bedrijven domineerden de BETT of gebied van STEM onderwijs. Dat deden ze opvallend goed, want het was vaak zeer druk bij de te kleine stands. Wij hebben er ook minstens de helft van onze kostbare tijd doorgebracht.

Opvallend daarbij was het bedrijf DFRobot, opvallend omdat dit bedrijf zowel elektronica componenten als lesbrieven en instructievideo’s voor al haar materiaal ontwikkeld heeft. Al snel viel de Boson Kit op, ooit een Kickstarter product. Boson is een set van kleurgecodeerde elektronische blokken die werken met micro:bit, en andere open source. In de Starter Kit zitten acht elektronische modules met sensoren en actuatoren om geluid, licht en bewegingsinteractie te ondersteunen. De Boson Kit is opschaalbaar en te coderen met Scratch, JavaScript of Python.
DFRobot concentreert zich niet alleen op Micro:Bit, ook voor Raspberry PI en Arduino hebben zij diverse speciaal voor het onderwijs ontwikkelde modules gemaakt. Aan de stand muur hangt de LattePanda V1.0, een Windows 10 mini pc met een geïntegreerde Arduino processor waarmee de Boson Kit kan samenwerken. De website van DFRobot is de moeite waard om eens te bekijken

Robots in alle soorten en maten lijken de BETT te domineren. Prijs en complexiteit zorgen ervoor dat we aan een aantal stands niet te veel tijd besteden. Wel nemen we tijd voor de stand van Gomer.
We zien daar een eenarmige robot leuke stunts uithalen en vragen naar de meerwaarde. Volgens de producent is Gomer de eerste intelligente robot met kunstmatige intelligentie (AI) Het apparaat herkent gezichten, patronen en emoties. Met grafische programmering van Googles Blocky kunnen opdrachten worden gemaakt.

Een andere robotfirma is MioROBOT. Ook daarvoor weer net als bij de vorige een grafisch programmeerbare omgeving. Mio zegt vooral geschikt te zijn voor het primair onderwijs, hetgeen voor ons enkel te beoordelen valt op basis van de vele gebruikte kleurtjes.
Hoewel producten uit China een prominente plek lijken in te nemen zijn uiteraard ook andere landen bezig het curriculum met eigen materialen vorm te geven.
Uit Engeland komt het bedrijf INVENT . Invent heeft een knutseldoos bedacht. Met schroefjes en op Meccano lijkende blikken platen bouw je een hijskraan of auto die via de Micro:Bit aan te sturen is.

Bij het Tsjechische ITveSKOLE werd verwezen naar lesmateriaal dat verkrijgbaar is op de website. De makers gaven daarbij hoog op over hoe mooi dat te gebruiken is bij maakonderwijs oftewel STEM. Ook uit Turkije waren STEM materialen te zien. Het Engels klinkende bedrijf Twin had zijn technologie op een LEGO achtige onderbouw gebaseerd. Met behulp van Twin modules zijn technologieën uit de dagelijkse praktijk na te bouwen, denk daarbij aan een huisalarm of automatische deur. Dit alleraardigst ogende materiaal richt zich vooral op het primair onderwijs. Via hun website is lastig na te gaan wat men nastreeft, maar speciaal voor de engelstalige markt is er de website .

In de persruimte werden we onverwacht getrakteerd op een presentatie van Graham Brown-Martin. Zijn bedrijf lanceerde daar de pi-top 4, een vierkant doosje met volgens hem de modernste onderwijsmogelijkheden. Het grijze doosje heeft een Raspberry Pi als besturingssysteem. In een introductiefilmpje zagen we dat het lichte kastje als besturingssysteem voor een drone een vogelvlucht maakte. Met behulp van de pi-top zijn vooral omgevingsveranderingen vast te leggen. Daarbij is volgens de bedenkers het kastje een volwaardige lichte computer. Je vraagt je af, weer een robot hype of is het echt bruikbaar.
Pi-top is in elk geval interessant genoeg om eens nader onder de loep te nemen.

Wie naar Bett gaat en denkt daar jaarlijks grote veranderingen aan te treffen zal teleurgesteld raken. Jaarlijks lijkt het alsof je meer van hetzelfde te zien krijgt. De Bett show is een plek waar je wel ideeën op kunt doen, er zijn immers zoveel mensen die over onderwijs en het gebruik van digitale leermiddelen nadenken.

CIDREE meeting

Fri, 12 Apr 2019 00:00:00 +0000

On the 11th of April, ten countries joined their computational brainpower to explore each other’s vision on Computational and Mathematical thinking. What started as a little chaotic conversation, after 30-45 minutes this conference found it’s a voice. We started with a Skype call to Paul Drijvers from the University of Utrecht. I love a chaotic start of a conference. :-)

With the dedication I come to expect from experts in education; we started to map our contexts and developed posters. Each country had a short presentation, with a colorful and diverse slide deck (to be added later here), we got a glimpse on the internal workings in a country on computational and mathematical thinking. I’ll wait until the slide decks have been published to give a detailed account. However, a few fun facts;

Norway doesn’t have a subject called it/computer science/informatics.
The ComputerBasedMath.org initiative presented great teaching materials.
Every country is struggling with computational thinking and how to embed it in other subjects or even offer it as a separate subject in the lessen table.
Alec Titterton from Wolfram shared a great resource! Wolframe projects for the Raspberry Pi.

Paul Behan had a great question to stimulate our brain.
How to calculate the most efficient route for a frozen food delivery company after Brexit? With a nondirectional graph and a simplification of a map. Many aspects of computational thinking went into the problem-solving. Great fun!

The meeting ended at the national railway museum with an excellent dinner in the ‘first class waiting room’ and a guided tour in the museum. I’ve added a few pictures below of the museum, looking at pictures of people presenting is quite dull. The first picture reminded me of a kind of robot. :-)

Lunchtime walk at #CIDREE with @NCCAie @CambridgeMaths @nuigalway, with @moorland taking the photos! ☺️☀️@edtechne @ResearchatNUIG pic.twitter.com/pk3Mwhsfrq
— Cornelia Connolly (@corneliathinks) April 11, 2019

Understanding Music and taste better

Mon, 01 Apr 2019 00:00:00 +0000

Reviewing project, ‘help Moorlag understand music’. This is the result of one year of collecting music. The link to the playlist can be found here.

Using a collaborative playlist on Spotify, I started the project. One thousand songs later, I can conclude that the plan was a success. My followers on Instagram contributed, my students participated, and the internet learned the elegance of Musical preferences via crowdsourcing.

I felt a full array of emotions while listing to the Playlist. It was fun, sad, colorful, abrupt, slow, fast, and most of all, it connected. I feel that I understand my students better because of the music they shared. The contributor is mentioned in the Playlist. The top three contributors added value, not only in absolute terms but also in a relative sense. I was shocked that my students had a very, very broad sense of musical taste - music from the 50s to the present. I listened to it all. Even better, I use the playlist daily. It helps me connect with students, to their emotions, to their needs. And it is also great fun!

To prevent spamming on my playlist (yes, c-artists use it a lot!), the link can be found via my instagram account

Top contributes

Top artists

Numworks

Tue, 15 Jan 2019 00:00:00 +0000

What is it and how does it work?

This quick review of my unit starts off with a short story “Numworks about Numworks”. There is an online simulator of Numworks. It has all the same functions as the physical device.

_Targeting a high school audience and competing with Texas Instruments’ Ti-_nspire family, the NumWorks calculator is equipped with a non-touch color LCD2.

Translated from the Wiki

It offers a programmable interface in Python. Launched in France in the summer of 2017, the NumWorks calculator was quickly sold to several thousand students among French high schools, mainly thanks to a fine design, Python interface (programming language whose learning is mandatory in secondary education in France), the recommendations of many teachers and the creation of a community of users offering various applications online. The calculator is announced in open hardware (“open hardware”, schemas and plans are available) and under open source with a Creative Commons BY-NC-ND4 license.

Translated from the Wiki

This is a calculator that has a great design and Python build into the OS. Updating is easy, just a modern webbrowser with webUSB. The device runs on a 100 MHz Cortex-M processor. It’s lightning fast and the fun part… it runs Python! With software on GitHub and the community on Reddit makes for an impressive online presence. Repair is easy! The entire process in terms of hardware is open source, The level of documentation is impressive. It’s excellent. This is what documentation should look like. Did I already mentioned that it runs Python?

Why do you need it

Great design, build with durability from the beginning and it can be upgraded. It has all the functions of a regular calculator and it can be programmed without much extra training.

What’s the fun part?

It runs Python, had a USB connection and utilizes webUSB for updating. The calculator runs the core uPy and can be programmed with a computer. Or if you are up for a challenge… with the ABC-keyboard on the device. I’ve written a small script to return a random value of a dice.

Code Example

The example can also be found here

import random

#returns a number
def roll_dice():
  print (random.randint(1, 6))

print("""This python script returns a random value between 1 and 6. It's a dice""")

flag = True
while flag:
   user_prompt = input(">")
   if user_prompt.lower() == "quit":
      flag = False
   else:
     print("Rolling dice...\nYour number is:")
     roll_dice()

e-Estonia. Looking at others is confronting to yourself.

Wed, 14 Nov 2018 00:00:00 +0000

24 hours after returning home I suddenly felt an urge to write out my thoughts and feelings after being emerged in the Estonian educational system. UPDATE: It did take a few weeks to finalize this blog, let’s blame Trump ;-)

In retrospect, I enjoyed the trip to Estonia but the vast gap between a Gymnasium and a Polytech institute was so large I felt uncomfortable. The inequality between students is enormous. And I later heard that the Gymnasium we visited was in the average range.

I had great conversations with the students at both locations. Both types of students had an excellent vocabulary in English, both enjoyed school, both felt that this was ’their’ place. And somehow I felt uncomfortable. At the Gymnasium, I counted over 60 (!) boxed with LEGO Mindstorms (400 euro a pop), a theatre, a semi-Olympic pool and a conservatory (with a large fountain) and a lot of other student facilities. The Polytech had a few gifted printing presses, old computers, and no wifi-network. The age difference between the students was almost non-exciting. I discovered that a lot of Polytech students did talk better Russian then Estonian. Quite the opposite at the Gymnasium; everyone talked Estonian and English at C2-levels. And most the students also spoke German and French.

And somehow this country is functional.

The comparison is that most aspects of digital literacy are that we are on a similar level. In the Netherlands, we are having a large review of our curriculum with the help of curriculum.nu. I didn’t see any urgency in Estonia with educating in digital literacy. I’ve seen some students ‘working on digital literacy’; e.g. robotics and MS Word. It was strange, but a fun trip to visite that other European country.

e-Estonia, een intieme inkijk in een 'ander' Europees land.

Sat, 27 Oct 2018 00:00:00 +0000

We komen om klokslag 09.00 uur aan bij Innove, een nascholingscentrum voor leraren in Estland. Helena Karu-Baher geeft een overzicht van wat men voor heeft op gebied van teachertraining. Ze legt uit dat docenten & schoolleiding moeite hebben met de ontwikkeling van het lerarenberoep. Vooral schoolleiders hebben hiervan last, het land is kleiner en kent slecht weinig groeimogelijkheden. Schoolleiders krijgen het er vooral van langs. Ze weten niet hoe leraren te ontwikkelen en als leider innoveren ze te weinig. Wie in Estland schoolleider wordt blijft dat vaak tot zijn pensioen.
Leraren worden universitair opgeleid. Dat gebeurt in Talinn & Tartu.

Historisch besef in Estland is enorm!

Estland in cijfers

143.700 leerlingen en 14.500 leraren.
1 leraar op 10 leerlingen, er zijn veel parttimers met name bij de beroepsopleidingen. Er zijn te weinig leraren voor First Grade en het Gymnasium. Leraren hebben in Estland een gemiddeld inkomen, op het platteland kan men er zeer goed van leven. Net als in Nederland is het salaris onderwerp van gesprek. Het beroep leraar is niet erg gewild. Lerarenopleidingen hebben geen toezicht op de stage van leraren. Men wil dat verbeteren. Meer cijfers vond ik op deze pagina.

De leraar als professional in Estland

Ontwikkeling en verbetering van het beroep leraar
Leraren- en schoolleider-programma ter professionalisering van de school, vooral gericht op beter leidinggeven, mentorschap en samenwerking met name op het gebied van techniek voor feedback en ondersteuning. Hier hoort ook leren van andere landen bij.

Hoe verloopt de professionalisering van leraren?
Op nationaal niveau worden opleidingen en diploma’s geregeld.
Er is een professionele competentie-beschrijving met standaard. Er komt een portfolio met hun activiteiten.
Een in-service-systeem voor training helpt de competenties verder te ontwikkelen. Het Europees ontwikkelingsfonds spendeert veel geld aan de volgende twee programma’s in Estland.

Bij de bijeenkomsten is men niet genegen te komen voor cursussen, meer werkt men aan houding en techniek verandering. Men kijkt middels training meer naar hoe beter les te geven met activerende lesvormen.
Bijzonder is dat de Estse leraren naar Nederland en Finland gaan om te zien hoe men actiever kan laten leren. In 2018 was de opbrengst uitstekend. Ruim 80% van de scholen doet mee aan het programma ter verbetering van het onderwijs. Het loopt zeer slecht met de deelname van de schoolleiders.

E-ESTONIA CENTER rondleiding door Karli Suvisild

Estland wil graag het Europese innovatiecentrum zijn. Daarom is het als e-burger mogelijk om documenten - inclusief wetten - digitaal te ondertekenen, zelfs vindt men dat internet een grondrecht is. Wij staan voor de E-estonia showroom om te kijken hoe de Esten dat doen.

In Estland zijn alle online diensten aangesloten op één overheidsportal. Belastingaangifte doen duurt slechts enkele minuten en gebeurt volledig online. “Alleen voor trouwen, scheiden en je huis verkopen mag je in een andere sfeer komen zegt Karli Suvisild van het prachtige bezoekerscentrum e-Estonia.

Hij laat zonder problemen zijn persoonsgegevens uit het elektronisch patiëntendossier zien: paspoort en ID-kaart, burgerlijke staat, medische gegevens. Moet je in Nederland voor komen, daar liep dat stuk op privacy bezwaren. Bang voor de Poetin hackers lijken de Esten niet. “Grote bedrijven als Facebook en Google hebben heel veel informatie over ons, net als de overheid die al heeft. In Tallinn zit ook het cybersecurity centrum van de NAVO en het IT-centrum van de Europese Unie. “Het digitale overheidssysteem lijkt op een spinnenweb. Een van de slides is een overzichtelijk spinnenweb”. De informatie komt uit duizenden databases die met elkaar verbonden zijn. In een mooi boekje lees ik dat Estland graag veel virtuele burgers wil hebben. Zo maak je een klein land groot.
Door de verregaande digitalisering lijkt het land een aantrekkelijke plek te zijn voor startende ondernemers. Per hoofd van de bevolking kent Estland zeer veel startups (o.a. Skype komt hier vandaan). Met je e-residentiekaart van € 100,- kun je als buitenlander hier makkelijk een bedrijf opzetten in Estland. Alles uiteraard volledig online. Zo’n digitaal burgerschap kan iedereen ter wereld aanvragen. Na een screening kunnen ’e-burgers’ bij hun de Estse ambassade een ID-pas ophalen. Deze e-burgers hebben al veel bedrijfjes opgezet en betalen belasting. “We willen graag 10 miljoen virtuele burgers in 2025. Interessant voor een land van maar 1,3 miljoen inwoners”, zegt de woordvoerder van het programma. Ergens lees ik dat men in 2025 10 miljoen e-residents wil hebben. Of dat gaat lukken valt nog te bezien. Tot nu hebben ca. 25.000 buitenlanders zich bij de gemeenschap aangepast.
Als we de deur uitgaan passeer ik de tekst: Welcome in e-estonia.
Het valt op hoe open Karli is, hij logt in op zijn persoonlijk portaal van zijn elektronisch patiëntendossier en laat de notariële akte zien van zijn woning.

Google certified innovators

Mon, 10 Sep 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Last week I was surprised by the assignment of mentors. I was assigned a mentor for the Google Certified innovator program (see also my previous blog).

The project I am working on is called ‘are you still there’. An interactive system to measure the growth of students in a fun way. Not a system to pursuit students, but a system to give insight into learning and the absence of that learning. Based on the activity system of Git. This is going to be so much fun!

It was fun talking to Anders from Sweden. He has a unique insight into the Swedish school system. He was a head teacher at a school for a few years, taught Geography and is now managing IT at a few schools.

Kickstart Computer Science Education

Mon, 27 Aug 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Implementing a new core curriculum for Computer Science is a challenge. Adding twelve different optional modules is fun. The optional modules will be developed with the help of the bèta-support centers and with a lot of help from teachers. I’m attached to the development of networking & Internet of Things. It’s been a great adventure and I learned a lot. A lot about new protocols, transmission rates, data packet sizes and most importantly I rediscovered the joy of learning.

Every school holiday I try to develop a new skill (ranging from speaking Swedish to Origami). It’s fun to learn something new and I find it a great way to connect with my students. The fun and uncertainty of learning is something I really enjoy and it’s the modus operandi for a lot of students. From frustration to understanding, discovering, applying and implementing. A lot of these aspects my students experience on a daily basis.

These are the modules almost production ready. The core curriculum is being developed at the educational publishers (Instruct, Informatica-actief & Enigma). I’m so proud of what we have achieved. This really is a great step and a good journey for computer science in the Netherlands. I’ll update this blog when new teaching materials will be made available!

Colab? Spotify collaborative

Sat, 25 Aug 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Connecting with my students is something I really enjoy. One of my newest experiments is a collaborative playlist on Spotify. An easy way for students to send me tracks on Spotify.

‘Mister Moorlag, this you really need to hear’.

With the greatest of care, they arranged a starting playlist with 25 tracks. And then things started to grow! Now with over 28 hours of music; 420 tracks and 38 followers I think I found a new way to interact with my students. I’ve added the occasional song, and the feedback was great. We are not just exchanging songs, we are having a conversation about music, mood improvements and life. Life’s for sharing.

Want to be surprised by something new, something funky or something old? Subscribe to our music stream. Listen to it via Spotify Moorlag playlist via the list below.

Get ready to innovate, start your engines

Sat, 25 Aug 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Ladies, start your engines and may the best woman win. Get ready to innovate!

With the help of my students, I discovered RuPaul’s Drag race. I think it gives an alternative view on how Americans see themselves and each other (and Facebook has 70 (!) genders to choose from). I’m happy my students share these experiences with me. With a good connection, the learning happens almost automatically.

Innovation is just like gender; we are born with it and try to make the best of it. Innovation thrives with a cadence, a way of handling the process, an ideal system based on time or effort. And somehow RuPaul brings a smile to my face.

And now, lip-sync for your life.

This blog is now protected

Sun, 17 Jun 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Cloudflare?

With the help of Cloudflare my blog is now HTTPS enabled and in case of a DDoS attack the service also can help manage the traffic. It’s free! Cloudflare is a ‘content delivery network’ service. Basically is helps the web server to serve the website in a durable way to visitors (and prevents attackers from accessing the website).

Implementing

During the implementation, I used the knowledge base a lot. Feel free to speed up the process of implementing with these links.

It was really easy to start using Cloudflare. Together with Google Domains, it is easy to use and even easier to manage.

Cloudflare, Inc. is a U.S. company that provides content delivery network services, DDoS mitigation, Internet security and distributed domain name server services, sitting between the visitor and the Cloudflare user’s hosting provider, acting as a reverse proxy for websites.

How Lava Lamps keep the internet save

Student centered learning

Tue, 29 May 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Student-centered learning and subject cluster projects.

Hello World is my favorite magazine. It’s from the UK and is all about computer science and teaching/learning the subject. I was asked by my dear friend Miles Berry to prepare a 1000 word piece about student-centered learning. Quite a challenge I can assure you. I wrote about student-centered learning with ‘profielwerkstukken’ (final research projects in the last phase of education).

My students loved it, made my mother proud and I found a new skill.

Thanks to Yochem, Nathan & Jelle the project was a success, they developed an opensource hand prosthetic. With a muscle sensor and a custom PCB. In the project, pipeline is adding machine learning to the device and refining the fingers. Everything is documented very well on GitHub. The prosthetic can be built with €200 budget. My students are going to refine the design and lower the price even more. Everything is open source and can be adeptly easily. The article can be accessed here for free :-)

In the Netherlands, students have to carry out a final research project in the last two years of their secondary school education. This research must emphasize the level of the students in a clear manner. In the Netherlands, this research project is called ‘subject cluster project’ because the student can choose between a number of subject combinations. Students only have to create one subject cluster project, whether or not in collaboration with others. Got your interest? The entire article can be found here. HelloWorld 05.

Hello World with Yochem, Nathan & Jelle

Sladda? This is not yet an other bike review

Sun, 13 May 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Sladda, the IKEA bike

This is not yet another bike review or is it.

UPDATE: IKEA recalled the bike and I gave the bike back to IKEA :-( UPDATE: I bought a refurbished bike for roughly 15% of the orginal price :-)

Drinking my coffee in Amsterdam and letting my thoughts go free I noticed quite a few bikes with a blue tire. And that started this blog. Why buy a bike when you can lease one for the price of 3 Starbucks beverages a month. Or why buy a bike preassembled when you can have the fun of building your own bike with an IKEA kit :-) I have been using the bike for over 7 months.

Netherlands, land of thé bike

Amsterdam alone has over 847.000 bikes, in the Netherlands there over 22 million bikes! So, we know how to bike and most famous bike brands are Dutch, including VanMoof, Royal Gazelle, and Batavus. With more bikes then people you can state that we are a bike nation. Ask a random tourist and bikes will be in the top 3 things from the things they saw in the Netherlands.

I’ve used a bike since I was 3,5 years old. Learning to use a bike and be confident in using it takes practices, practices, and practices. My mother (and my father) helped with that a lot. First with side wheels (untranslatable), later on with the assistance of my parents. A few weeks later I’ve managed to use a bike independently. And with great power comes great responsibility, living near a canal.

Pros

Love the design and the lack of chain. It’s a sturdy bike and easy to assemble. Pricing is fair, and it’s a unique design. It has a great frame, sturdy and head-turning design. Using it daily is still fun, the design makes people turn their head and in the large bike storage in Den Bosch, it’s easy to find my bike. There is only one :-)

Cons

Having never built a bike from a kit it was quite a challenge to assemble it into a working bike. A few screws on the bike came lose during biking; scary! With some lock tight, the screws and bolts will not move again. The frame is sturdy, but a bit heavy.

Pricing

Starting from €399,-

Experimenting

Sat, 21 Apr 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Eat, sleep, learn & repeat

Based on the song from Fat Boy Slim; Eat, sleep, Rave & Repeat this is a mantra that sticks. Experimenting!

Learning is what sets us apart from the Neandertal. We can cope with setbacks, a change in environment and the ability to learn from feedback. In this short blog a few experiments to keep the mind busy, keep my employer happy, enjoy the benefits of being a Homosapien, to learn and share what is working!

Develop a sense of excitement

How to develop a sense of excitement (or urgency) is the key to achieve greatness. The video below shows it all. Learning how to do a kickflip (5:47hrs) isn’t a life skill, but it teaches so much about learning. I need to mention the article on Medium about the works of Papert (Mindstorms: what did Papert argue and what does it mean for learning and education?). Learning how to do a kickflip on a skateboard isn’t a life skill, but with the usage of the internet and learning from learning is key in developing excitement. For that purpose, I bought a skateboard and I am going to measure how long I need to develop the skill of using it as an alternative for a bike.

How to develop a culture of experimenting?

Start with communicating
Fail fast, learn fast
Make the skill applicable to a situation
- Skateboarding can help with fighting off RSI
- Counts as a workout
- And helps alleviate stress
Accept that you are not the expert, try to become the expert quickly
Engage the skill with every fiber
- Every ounce of bodyweight
  - Every kW of energy
Jump in, head first!
Push, boundaries are mostly only mentally

I´ve inspiration in the Urge of excitement from a Globetrotter.

Come on, why acclimate? We are globetrotters.

And the book the lean startup. It’s a great book when starting to think in ‘business terms’. Business can be broadly interpreted. It’s way of thinking, developing and testing, product-centered, consumer-owned.

Eat, sleep, learn & repeat

Current Experiments

This is a short list of current experiments.

Google Photos
Shared resources Google Calendar
Design thinking with our first-year students
Learning a way to implement the new CS curriculum.

A few days in Berlin

Tue, 03 Apr 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Really enjoyed a few days in Berlin.

In a few pictures here or with the context on Instagram

Fog, clouds & Google

Sun, 01 Apr 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Fog, just a surface based cloud not going Google.

It’s so easy to forget where we came from. Everything always on, always available and automatically saved with no real need to backup. Is this an idyllic world? Or a dystopian future? Is Google the answer?

Using state of the art technology is key to keep in touch with the world around us. With the adaptation of Google’s App suite and the tools connected to the suite, our students are now suited to envision a future where they are in control of their surrounding.

It’s more than just using technology, my students breathe a new way of thinking. Not single-minded but crowd-minded, not eleven different versions but one online document and saving… that’s something that is automated. And when left with a choice they form groups to boost performance.

With the usage of Google’s App suite, my colleagues enjoy the benefits of a clear and easy to use infrastructure to communicate with students and each other. We are now implementing group calendars and Google Drive file stream. One account for mail, documents and with a Single Sign-On application, all other accounts are now synced with the same account.

Going from fog to clouds.

A few things I learned from being an early adopter;

Never forget the 15% of colleagues that aren’t following the 85%
Starting is easy, completing the circle is a challenge.
Communicate the change.
Let students help with training colleagues.
Let students teach other students.
Enjoy the mistakes you make (yes we are all able to make mistakes).
- Make every mistake only once (or twice….)
Use GAM and automate Google Apps for education
NEVER stop learning

Roadmap

With a lot of things already implemented I try to focus on the items on the list below.

Group calendars
Teacher/parent meetings directly in the calendar
‘Take out’ for students ready to embrace the world
Self-taught courseware
Be a Google Certified Innovator (!)
Action script

Long Reads, a long reading list

Mon, 19 Mar 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Yes, I love long reads

This is just a short blog about a page I started some time ago in draft mode. The long reads that keep me up at night, things I really want to read and that started a new way of seeing things.

I really love how these blogs redefine my (world)view and I try to convey that feeling in my classes computer science. Longs reads require an effort and a conviction to continue on reading. They challenge, perhaps even convert but mostly they can pinch a nerve. A few of my favorite long reads can be found in this blog. I’ll keep a static page with all the hyperlinks to the long reads on my website.

Longreads features the best storytelling on the web from hundreds of publishers. Story picks include longform journalism, short stories, in-depth interviews, and even historical documents. - Longreads.com

The items on the page will be without any remarks or suggestions.

Want to add one? Or suggest a long read? I’m on Twitter!

7 lessons I learned from designing a new subject

Sun, 18 Mar 2018 00:00:00 +0000

To be worked out with working examples

These are the seven lessons I learned from designing a new school subject

Start with the end in mind
Let the learning happen
Give control
Eat sleep, learn repeat
Enjoy the boredom
Communicate the change
Be surprised

Why I teach (still in Dutch)

Wed, 31 Jan 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Sorry, Dutch only. With Google Translate this page can be in English.

Dit is de reden dat ik lesgeef

Net even vroeger dan gewenst zit ik weer in de trein naar ’s-Hertogenbosch (05.45 eruit; 23:45 erin).

Gisteravond waren de profielwerkstuk (PWS) presentaties van atheneum. Met enige trots stonden daar drie heren in witte overhemden. Een presentatie tot in perfectie geoefend (en toch nog ergens een vage zweem van zenuwen zichtbaar in hun gezichten) te geven.

Yochem, Nathan en Jelle lieten hun opbrengsten zien van bijna een jaar ontwikkelen aan een hand prothese. Ze namen ons mee in hun zoektocht, hun problemen en hun oplossingen. Er zou een hand prothese volledig zelf ontworpen worden. En wat voor een; met de detectie van spierkracht in de bovenarm, met vooraf instelbare posities en knijpkracht. En… alles open source en zeer goed gedocumenteerd. Het waren korte nachten, weinig weekenden volgens de heren.

Echt alles is in een eigen ontwerp gemaakt. In TinkerCAD ! Alle 3d-prints werden met liefde ontworpen. Er was geen printplaat klein genoeg om in een hand te verwerken. Met een grote glimlach werd er ook nog even een printplaat ontworpen. De software is een vereist een behoorlijk abstractieniveau en een goed begrip van de programeertaal en daar ben ik nog wel meeste trots op. Deze opdracht zou niet misstaan in een informatica propedeuse.

Afgelopen week kreeg ik een bericht van Yochem met de vraag of het mogelijk was om hun presentatie in collegezaal te geven. Er was nogal een lijst met genodigden; ouders, grootouders, tantes & ooms… het leek bijna een familiereunie . Bijna iedereen kon zitten ;-) Tot mijn verbazing ging atheneum 5 staan om alles goed te observen.

Er werden woorden van dank geuit naar Peter (eerste begeleider), Peter (en de andere technisch onderwijs assistenten), ouders en de sponsering van school. Ook mijn naam viel even (backup begeleider en de man van de koffie hoorde ik later).

Mensen vragen mij wel eens waarom ik voor de klas sta, dit is de reden dat ik voor de klas sta. En nu weer er vol tegenaan, vanmiddag komen de kinderen van de basisschool en de cyclus is rond.

We gaan eens iets doen met programmeren denk ik :-)

Things and thought about the BETT

Tue, 23 Jan 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Traveling to… (and yes, this is a growing blog)

Yes, I’m inbound to London! Together with one of the board members from i&i I’m attending BETT.

Update: impressions and finds added to the blog.

After a couple of hours at the BETT (pronounced as one word) I am impressed. With over 850 educational technology companies and 35.000 visitors is it one of the biggest conventions in the world. It is always good to catch up with good friends like Miles Berry and the great people of the Holland Business group.

With a bag of gadgets, hardware and software licenses I have a field day writing about it. I’ll be doing something on the devices from DFRobot and Kittronic. Expect it in the upcoming weeks on my blog or over on the Microbit.studio blog.

I like the Boson Science Kit for Micro:Bit (I received a small demo package). With the kit, you can do (or better, students) 50+ projects. The back of all the sensors are magnetic and compatible with Lego. As we know from Micro:Bit everything is tied together with blocks of code. I’m going to build a red button nuclear launch device. Beat that mister Trump ?.

All the code I build will be available on GitHub.

Meetings & Appointments at and around BETT

I’m honored to be talking with the people from PythonAnywhere (around the BETT). Looking forward to the wine & dine on Wednesday.

My students love their online Python environment. It’s my experience that the free plan is more than enough to learn and development Python.

Especially with the help of The Coder’s Apprentice. A very complete (but in-depth) course designed for people without any coding skills or experience. I’ve asked the school print shop for a few copies (pdf EN, pdf NL, answers) and handed to a few students as an experiment. What happened in a few days? I reordered a couple of prints, ‘zoete broodjes’, students loved his writing style and the challenge he provided. Invest 100 hours and you understand the basics, invest an extra 100 and you start to become an expert. Don’t use the answers when the going start to get tough (And remember.. the tough get going).

PythonAnywhere is a Python development and hosting environment that displays in your web browser and runs on our servers. They’re already set up with everything you need. It’s easy to use, fast, and powerful. There’s even a useful free plan.

I’ll keep you posted about the joy of attending one of the biggest edu tech conference in Europa.

Travel?

Photo by Margo Brodowicz on Unsplash[/caption]

Developing websites with Github

Mon, 22 Jan 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Building the next web with GitHub?

And where do I start as a teacher with GitHub?

In the Dutch computer science core curriculum(pdf) it is stated that students should be aware of coding techniques and data representation. And my students love data representation. The love starts with basic html, css and a little javascript. The fun of code is something most students get in a few lessons. And using industry tools like GitHub gives my students a competitive advantage!

We designed an assignment to develop a basic (and static) website in 15-17 hours; the time does include learning the language. Students can really lose themselves in the assignment. I’ve seen websites build in not 15-17 but in 30-40 hours. It is really a creative outlet for the young adolescent.

In this blog, I want to get into the practical implications of building websites with students and how to publish them on the web. And in the slipstream how to use industry tools, techniques, and standards.

Examples of their work can be found in the repository on GitHub.

Hosting on GitHub

Starting with GitHub is at first a bit intimidating. It’s an industry tool and not an educational tool. So it’s well maintained, documentation is up to date and the tool actually works. (sight for the edu tools).

Hosting on GitHub is relatively easy. Together with Jesse van der Pluijm and Sander Laarhoven we designed a hands-on guide on the subject GitHub Pages. For accessible it’s in Dutch. The guide Handleiding GitHub can be found here.

In a short survey, I’ve learned a lot about using GitHub and updated the guide accordingly. I’ve asked my students for short statements about GitHub in English so that the findings can be shared with a broader community (you). Do try to read between the lines. My students love building things, especially things that can be viewed by other people. Students shared the following feedback with me.

Student feedback

Search what you need, don’t use any classes, it costs way too much time.
Make sure you know your shit before you start.
Making mistakes isn’t the end of the world, you learn from it.
Take your time to built a website
Do not forget to save!!!
Google and Stack Overflow are your biggest friends.
Trial and error. It’s the only way.
If you get stuck with a thing don’t work further because otherwise, it will take much time.
never give up and try
Learn from your mistakes and not from the explanation.
Background set it to fixed. Then you will create a parallax effect!
Use your time, you will need it!
On youtube, you can also find a lot of explanation about building a website because then they explain it step by step and so you can also follow it.
start and learn while you work.
use w3schools
Make use of w3schools.
Vraag dingen aan de docent als je vastloopt. Gebruik atom i.vp. html-kit tools.
Use w3schools it is really useful
Start with the basics, and work out the details.
Follow what you think is best.
Nothing that you do is wrong if you feel good about it.
you first have to practice well
learn while practicing
Start on your website as soon as possible.
Start simple and work accurately.
If you don’t know how to make something: Just search a video or a tutorial!
Trial and error. It’s the only way.
Stay positive
Use code academy to learn how to build a website. It takes a lot of time to finish it but it’s very useful.
Don’t worry about the little things when you first get started on your site. Worry about them when/if you have time left.
Start simple, then add more things to it. Don’t get too chaotic at the beginning.
try Javascript, it really is fun.
When you don’t know how to fix a problem, search it on google or on youtube. There is a big chance that it will tell you what to do plus you will save you time.
Don’t give up if you don’t know how to do something. Also, Google is your best friend
Don’t begin officially just try something first and this way you can build your website. (don’t expect it is easy)
Do the workshop on codecademy
There are many helpful people online on forums. If you run into any problems, don’t hesitate to ask them for help.
When in doubt use
“Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.”
It is more work than you think!
Oiy mate! Take inspiration from sites you like using and everything will be fine.
Don’t spend too much time on w3schools, start with codeacademy and use w3schools as a helping tool during the building process
Start in time!
Veel proberen en als iets niet lukt gewoon vragen
Make sure you read a lot about what kind of things you want to put on your website because there is a lot you can find on the internet about building a website.
If u don’t know how to do something, google it.
Google everything
Everything is possible!
Use w3schools
Make sure you put your website online when the teacher explains how because otherwise, you won’t know how to do it
Work accurately when building a website. A small mistake can have a big impact on the website and a small alteration can solve a big problem.

Looking up?

Why this picture? Again a Wonderfull free picture from Unsplash.

Unsplash Beyond the Cosmos by Joshua Sortino

Getting started with Jekyll

Sun, 21 Jan 2018 00:00:00 +0000

After letting the dust settle on Jekyll (and just a lack of time to develop) I am learning Jekyll ?.

What is Jekyll?

First of all, a small quote from the documentation site.

“Jekyll is a simple, blog-aware, static site generator. It takes a template directory containing raw text files in various formats, runs it through a converter (like Markdown) and our Liquid renderer, and spits out a complete, ready-to-publish static website suitable for serving with your favorite web server.”

It does what you tell it to do, no more, no less. It doesn’t try to outsmart users by making bold assumptions, nor does it burden them with needless complexity and configuration. Put simply, Jekyll gets out of your way and allows you to concentrate on what truly matters: your content.

In easy to understand words; it’s a framework to change Markdown files to HTML files and use them to power a website. Content updating can’t be made easier with a static website.

Why use it?

Jekyll is efficient and eliminates copying & pasting websites. It uses Markdown (so writing content for a website is easy). Furthermore, it can be hosted on GitHub using GitHub Pages. Managing a web server is no longer needed. GitHub automatically runs the proper commands to render the Markdown file to a HTML file. GitHub ❤️.

How to learn it?

I’ve watched a few Youtube videos, consulted with an expert and read a lot about Jekyll. YouTube is filled with videos with setting up guides, use cases and tutorials.

The sources I found especially relevant

Results

I’ve built one website with it. The site is called NerdNight. An evening at school for students to work on their projects and some interesting breakout sessions. It’s hosted on GitHub. The result can be viewed here. NerdNight.rocks

I learned how to use Jekyll and GitHub for deployment and I had a very good time doing it :-)

Sewing machine?

Sewing machine Image credit Unsplash by Annie Spratt.

Why the Sewing machine? Because the first version of mechanization provided users with a means to sew a lot faster, without knowing the exact process inside the machine.

Let's automate the F* out of G Suite with GAM and Bulk operations

Wed, 03 Jan 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Yes, this is a long overdue update G Suite.

Yesterday I was called by the lovely people of Google. I started transferring a Google Apps for business /G Suite installation from one URL to a different URL and I got stuck. Glenn from the support desk saw that I left an installation not finished and reached out to me. And what a great service I got. There was a small problem with the MX records in the Direct Admin panel. How I hate the Direct Admin / MX/DNS records is an entirely different blog… but it’s working.

Long story short, the backend of my domain is now run on Google Apps. It’s so convenient and easy to work with. After finishing the transfer I needed to find a way to remove a lot of mock users from a previous project. The solution was GAM (short for Google Administration?). A command prompt interface (no GUI!) to edit an entire domain. It’s scary at first, but very easy to learn. The startup guide on Github is easy to follow and I’ve had my GAM running in no time. Let’s automate the F* out of G Suite ? Que Bulk operations

Tips for easy but complex Bulk operations.

Doing a lot with little …. use batch files!

Use a spreadsheet
Compiling a long list of changing data? Use the fill tool!
Combine different items with " = A1 & " " & B1
The " " is for the space between two different commands
Copy the list with combined commands in a txt-file and
With GAM batch you can execute the magic

Icons made by Smashicons from www.flaticon.com is licensed by CC 3.0 BY

To do list

The following items are done or still in progress.

Remove old user accounts (DONE)
Adding all services for Google (DONE)
Adding Google Home (NOT DONE)
Enjoying the ’ I did it all myself’-feeling (partially DONE).

UPDATE: Yes, I am in love ❤️with GAM. Automatic update every Google Profile picture (the icon on the right) with this command; gam user wordpress update photo hipster.png.The hipster.png is courtesy of Smashicons. GAM is also very friendly with batch commands. With the batch commands, I have a different email account for every different service (facebook@, xbox@, ect).

What is Google Apps / G Suite? This mysterious video says it all. This is how it could be. When your apps begin with a G.

Eat, sleep, MAKE & repeat

Sat, 23 Sep 2017 00:00:00 +0000

Reflections on EHVMMF

The day after…

Friday - MakerED Meetup

Still, a bit impressed by the Eindhoven Maker Faire. Thanks to Arjan van de Meij I went to the Meetup on Friday; topic Maker Education. The power of making things and learning at the same time.

After a warm welcome by our host Arjan I really enjoyed the talk from René Pare. He is one of the organizers of the Maker Faire Eindhoven and he knows how to sell a story. What a fun guy!

Anouk Wipprecht made my day. What an energetic woman! Passioned and really witty. Her presentation was spot on and she showed us the way to draw outside the lines. Her 37 (!) dresses are all interactive and beautiful (sadly only size 37).

Sunday - Maker Faire

Starting

Fri, 01 Sep 2017 00:00:00 +0000

The hardest part of something new is starting.

This is a reflection of the first week of school. It was intense, it always is.

I try to get to know my new students. I try to say hello to new colleagues. Luckily this school gets it. We started off with a dine and walk in ’s-Hertogenbosch. A light and informal way to catch up with my colleagues and getting to know the new ones. And.. After a few dine and walks I have a very good knowledge of the culinary highlights of ’s-Hertogenbosch.

Starting this new school year I’ll be developing and teaching a new subject. Design and innovation. Together with Saskia de Kort.

What’s in it for the students?

Computer science is a different subject than the other ones being taught in the secondary education. This subject demands that I keep up to speed with recent developments. (Windows Phone… hello?). Not only due to the technology running obsolete also because my students ask for it. With questions like ‘Can we develop in xyz’,’How about xyz’ and ‘Why don’t we have access to xyz’. It’s fascinating to see the development of my students after a few months. From a ’laid back/lying on the table’ to an active and positive attitude. They get the newest technology, the newest platform to develop and the coolest applications are being built.

How to manage learning without 20 clones of the teacher

Short answer, you can’t.

Long answer, you can.

In offering the newest technology to my students I need to manage their learning in a different way. With a lot of variations in their assignment, it’s impossible to manage it in a conventional way. By using modern software development tools like Agile (scrum) I try to keep every student’s learning focused. It still needs a lot of attention and care for my students.

By changing the mindset from ‘my teacher is my example/copy the teacher’ to ‘the teacher is my guide, my sherpa, to learn with’ the expectations changes. I am unable to have all the knowledge in my field directly available. Again, bye Windows Phone, hello Apple Watch. The technology is quickly developing, the insights on learning to change even more rapidly. The solution is to have students do the thing they are best at. ‘Eat, sleep, learn, repeat’. In Dutch, the word leerling contains the word leer. Learning can be easily seen in that word. Let them learn.

What are the tools?

I’ve worked a lot with Agile and scrum based tools. Targetprocess is one of my personal favorites. It keeps the students focused on their learning and with some tinkering, it’s possible to have a complete overview of the learning happening in a group. ❤️ Burndown chart. When the Burndown stops or levels out it’s a sign. The learning has stopped.

But an easy kan ban board also does the trick. To do | Doing | Done. It keeps the learner on the learning and the teacher focused on the learner. Starting with tools is always a challenge. Just start using them the way they were intended and be surprised!

Lockdown teaching

Wed, 30 Aug 2017 00:00:00 +0000

Emergency teaching during a lockdown

Let’s call it by its name. We are in a phase of emergency teaching. This isn’t remote teaching or online teaching. This is emergency teaching during a lockdown. And yes, it’s normal to feel tired. The productivity of students and teachers alike is lower. In this blog, I want to share 6 tips from my own experience.

Tip 1 Accept the lockdown situation

This was the hardest one for me. I’ve been teaching from home for quite some time and I know it’s a challenge for everyone. Staying at home and losing control over your schedule. Or, as one of my students called it, losing the freedom to save us all. Accepting the situation is a huge step. Yes, we are at home, yes, my contact with students is different, yes, in other situations, I could XYZ. It helps no one to keep affirming that offline teaching is better. What does help is accepting and offering help! And keep perspective. This lockdown is going to end.

Lockdown, keep perspective!

Tip 2 Stay in contact during a lockdown

For the sanity of yourself and others, keep in contact. We are social creatures. There is a reason why we enjoy breaks with others, drinking coffee. A goal to keep in contact is to have a non-work related call with a friend, family member, or colleague a day. It helps to stay connected and share experiences. Everyone can feel alone. And the quickest solution is to stay in contact. Be explicit when communicating and when in doubt over-communicate. And I try to plan the next meeting during the current meeting. Not only useful during a lockdown.

Tip 3 Routine during a lockdown

Routines ensure that everything you need to do is done. Yes, I know, it’s a dead giveaway. Even if my first lesson is at 11.00 (am), I always have an alarm set for 7.00. Breakfast, coffee, and ready to start another day. Because I shut down every computer I use at night; the machine is responsive in the morning. Using the stand-by function is causing many problems during a conference call (also known as I can’t have that now). Lunch and diner are also at planned moments. Your own health is priority number one. And reboot/shutdown computers/iPads/iPhones helps a lot with speedy and snappy responses

Tip 4 Boundaries

Set boundaries and manage them proactively. With family members and disturbing you during your work, with coworkers, and no replies after working hours. With yourself, no Netflix at 10.00 (am), no phone in the bed.

Tip 5 Mental fitness

Our brains need stimulation. Try to find a new hobby or learn a new skill. I started baking bread. One of the great communities for a lot of things (and a lot of garbage) is Reddit. I learned a lot from Breadit. I was lucky to have a great mentor (thanks Rico!), he is famous for his breads. Share the newly acquired skills (see tip 2). I’ve started blogging again! It’s a good way to organize thoughts, and the product of that organizing is always fun to put in writing. Daily I ride my bicycle, the IKEA one (from a previous blog)

Lockdown mental fitness

Tip 6 know the tools, really know them!

In a traditional environment, you have a whiteboard, beamer, and perhaps even a chalkboard. Learn everything there is about the new tools. Google Meet has a few hidden features (most of them are located in the overflow (look for three dots)-menu. Help and support help a lot to identify a problem (bandwidth or CPU problems). Bandwidth problems are solved by getting closer to a Wi-Fi access point or limit machines on the network. CPU problems are solved by closing all but one window (close Spotify/outlook helps a lot!)

The story of an Idea?

Wed, 30 Aug 2017 00:00:00 +0000

Think and leap, how to create an Idea.

UPDATE: This is the introduction presentation design & innovation for new students. Presentation is in Dutch.

This is one of those moments. Developing a new subject, without formal grading, all about learning. It’s a new Idea! The foundation of the subject is going to be computer science, informatics, and design. Combining the two feels like a natural fit. Developing great things that also look great. There is a lot I do not know and I am keen to learn. Firstly, how do students react to the lack of numbers (grades) for their progress? Secondly, what are topics they really want to investigate? Thirdly, how do they manage the learning? At the same time my students are faced with numbers at the other subjects, so that’s going to be interesting.

I am really looking forward to pushing the boundaries of learning and I need to step out of my comfort zone to do it. Letting the learning happen ‘by accident’. My biggest personal battle is to keep my students focused and let them formulate their goal(s). To start things off I found a ‘perfect’ video (from the Google 2017’s IO). The story of an Idea. It’s a general approach of letting an Idea blossom.

YouTube video

Together with my college Saskia de Kort and our 32 students, we are going to have a great time. Developing a new Idea. Letting students grow and helping them become the best version of them selfs. Based on the books on my book shelve. Looking forward to a new thing. I’m going to document the process and I do need help! This is so scary, so inspirational and is going to fuel this school year. I am looking forward to letting students gave a big say in their development. And… wow… no formal grading. A new Idea :-)

Presentation in Dutch

Commemorative speech: Guidance is internal

Mon, 14 Aug 2017 00:00:00 +0000

Commemorative speeches, ds. Pierson College. In Dutch.

Projection mapping - Guidance is internal.

Zo vlak voor het lanceren van een ruimteveer volgt er een fase van interne beheersing. Mission control geeft de controle uit handen en draagt deze over aan de commander. De commander is volledig verantwoordelijk voor de daadwerkelijke start. Guidance is internal heet deze term. De afgelopen 6 jaar hebben mijn collega’s en ik er alles aan gedaan om alle kritische massa aan boord te krijgen. Voor veel leerlingen is de fase van guidence internal pas na het eindexamen. Voor jullie kwam dat moment iets eerder. En daar staan we bij stil

Met veren, een paar, want jullie kunnen al vliegen!

Even stil staan bij een bijzonder moment.

We staan niet alleen stil bij een bijzonder PWS, we staan ook stil bij een bijzonder duo. Een duo dat zich zo wist te versterken dat ik na de start geen enkele twijfel had over het resultaat. Harde werkers, kritisch op zichzelf, kritisch op elkaar. En er gebeurde iets bijzonders! Na een van de bespreeksessies kwamen ze om beurt naar mij toe; Doe ik wel voldoende. Ik wil de ander niet teleurstellen. Deze ene zin zegt zoveel over hun samenwerking.

Na een prachtig uitgewerkt research plan konden ze starten. Deze heren redden het wel zei ik nog tegen Jose. Vooral niet teveel er bovenop en ze laten groeien, laten bloeien.. Het is duidelijk, guidence is internal!

En toen werd ik ziek. Met grote dank aan Jose voor het opvangen van de PWS begeleiding. En het pws ging onverminderd door. Met enige kippenvel denk ik terug aan een periode van appjes, mails en zo af en toe een videoconferentie Een mooi lichtpuntje zo middenin ziek zijn.

Guus en Niels redden het. Alles komt prachtig bij een. Ons schoolgebouw is nog nooit zo verlicht geworden dat het de krant haalt, mensen op het perron op ‘s-Hertogenbosch Oost bewust een trein later nemen en het al mijn collega’s stil achterlaat. Projecting mapping Pierson is een groot succes! Meerdere rondes, en de banken zitten vol. Al hun energie, liefde en nauwkeurigheid komen precies op tijd op het juiste moment samen.

ds. Pierson College 2016-2017