Swamp Boat

• Review the Swamp Boat lesson in the LEGO^® Education SPIKE^™ App.
• If necessary, pre-teach these related vocabulary words: content, modifications, notify, observe, and predict.
• Consider the abilities and backgrounds of all your students. Differentiate the lesson to make it accessible to everyone. See the Differentiation section below for suggestions.
• If time allows, plan and facilitate the math extension. See the Extension section below for more information.

• Facilitate a quick discussion about modifying an existing object to achieve a goal.
  • Talk with your students about needing to see what's under the water.
  • Ask questions, like: What could you change about your eyes to make them able to see under the water? What would you need?
• Introduce your students to the story’s main characters and the first challenge: telling Sofie when her boat is near a crocodile.
• Distribute a brick set and a device to each group.

• Have your students use the LEGO^® Education SPIKE^™ App to guide them through their first challenge:
  • Create and test the program that tells Sofie when her boat is near a crocodile.
• Have your students iterate and test their models to complete the next two challenges in the app:
  • Modify the program to tell Sofie in a different way when her boat is near a crocodile.
  • Upgrade the swamp boat to help Sofie find other animals.
• You can find coding and building support in the Tips section below.

• Gather your students together to reflect on their completed challenges.
• Ask questions, like: How did Sofie know when she was near a crocodile? What did you change about how the swamp boat told Sofie when she was near a crocodile? What did the swamp boat do then?

• Prompt your students to discuss and reflect on modifying an existing program.
• Ask questions, like: Why is it important to be able to modify an existing program? How did you decide which Coding Blocks to use when you modified your program?
• Have your students clean up their workstations.

• Ask guiding questions to encourage your students to “think aloud” and explain their thought processes and reasoning in the decisions they've made while building and programming.

Observation Checklist

• Measure your students’ proficiency in modifying an existing program.
• Create a scale that matches your needs. For example:
  1. Needs additional support
  2. Can work independently
  3. Can teach others

Self-Assessment

• Have each student choose the brick that they feel best represents their performance.
  • Yellow: I think I can modify an existing program.
  • Blue: I can modify an existing program.
  • Green: I can modify an existing program, and I can help a friend do it too.

Peer-Feedback

• In their small groups, have your students discuss their experiences working together.
• Encourage them to use statements like these:
  • I liked it when you…
  • I'd like to hear more about how you…

Coding Tip

• After your students complete their first challenge, they'll be provided with three Inspiration Coding Blocks to help them modify their programs.
• The Inspiration Coding Blocks are intended to spark their imaginations as they experiment to find their own solutions.

Model Tip

• After your students complete their second challenge, they’ll be provided with three Inspiration Images and an open-ended prompt for improving their models.
• The Inspiration Images are to help spark their imaginations as they experiment and change their models.

There aren't any building instructions for this challenge.

Simplify this lesson by:

• Reading the Swamp Boat story and instructions from the LEGO^® Education SPIKE^™ App aloud to your students
• Selecting one Inspiration Image to help your students change their models

Increase the difficulty by:

• Exploring new and different coding blocks in the program
• Prompting your students to modify each other’s programs to improve each other’s work

• Have your students keep track of the number of animals Sofie’s boat detects. Ask them to create a bar graph and calculate how many more and how many less of each animal the boat encountered.

If facilitated, this will extend beyond the 45-minute lesson.

Math: CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.3.MD.B.3