This months' after-school tech help sessions will be canceled. These sessions were to be held on April 3rd (Lancaster) and April 4th (Lebanon). Please contact Lori Blantz or Hillary Holler if you need assistance before the last sessions in May (2nd & 7th). As a reminder, we are only holding the after-school tech help sessions if either Hillary or Lori is notified that you will be coming. Please notify us by the start of the week that the help sessions will be provided. Thank you.

The month of April will be my final ECSES Tech Item Contest. This contest is around coding, so I decided to have two items to win. One for the younger students and one for the older students. Although not all our students will grow up to be programmers, coding helps foster life skills such as learning how-to problem solve, overcome obstacles and collaborate with their peers which are lasting skills all people need to succeed in life. Coding builds important life skills that are challenging to cultivate in students with learning needs such as, organization, higher order thinking, self-esteem, socialization and teamwork, as well as sequencing, problem solving, math concepts, along with perseverance, so that they will become better readers, writers, and mathematicians. Most students with disabilities struggle with low self-esteem, and coding is an avenue that builds confidence in one’s ability to learn and create, and cultivate a sense of pride from producing their own original work. The first item for the younger students, the Learning Resources Code & Go Robot Mouse Activity turns coding into a hands-on analog activity for tactile and visual learners. The robot mouse is similar to the Bee Bot that was given away before. As the students learn to program they build key skills that include critical thinking, problem solving, sequencing, and programming fundamentals. This is geared to students abilities of 5 years old and up. The second item is called Snap Circuits Jr and you can create over 100 STEM projects using this Electronics Exploration Kit. This kit is geared for students abilities of 8+ with hands-on experience of building models of working electrical circuits. This kit has a color manual with visual pictures of creating different electronic projects. There is no soldering, no tools, it just snaps together to create items like a flashing light, adjustable-volume siren. This item has received the following awards: the National Parenting Center-Seal of Approval, Dr. Toy 100 best children's products, Dr. Toy best educational products, and is STEM approved for education. So check these items out and enter the final contest for the 2018-2019 school year. Thanks for all your work with our students.

Jessica Sweitzer won a BreakoutEDU box to use with her Speech and Language students. In her essay she shared that this year she had the opportunity to borrow BreakoutEDU boxes to use with a variety of her students. The students' excitement of reaching a shared goal became tangible. Watching everyone work together to solve problems and open actual locks to “win” was incredible. Her students continued to ask her on a weekly basis when is their next "breakout". Now she is so excited to have her own box! Thank you Jessica for the work you do with our students.

Hi Everyone! Hillary and I wanted to thank everyone so much for the wonderful donations for STEM. We have a had an overabundance of items received for this school year and no longer need any STEM donations. Check out our STEM donations!

Just wanted everyone to know that the 6 remaining Instructional Technology Help Sessions will be held on an as needed basis. Hillary and I will be available if you let us know that you are coming. Email lori_blantz@iu13.org or hillary_holler@iu13.org if you plan to attend any of the remaining sessions. We can meet with you face to face or via Lync. Please email us at least the day before the session. Thank you.

Check out the next contest information on the right hand side of this Blog. Good luck.

Coding! Learning to code has become increasingly prevalent in school curricula. From after-school clubs to dedicated class periods, coding and computer science curriculum are popping up in schools worldwide. There are many benefits of coding for students in Special Education. Coding builds important life skills such as organization, higher order thinking, self-esteem, socialization and teamwork. These skills are intrinsically hard for many children with disabilities such as Attention Deficit Disorder, Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, and Autism. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention these disabilities can affect 1 in 68 school aged children. Many students in our classrooms suffer from low self esteem. Coding builds confidence in one’s ability to learn and create, as well as pride from actually creating something. Many learn-to-code platforms are accessible and easy to get started for everyone. Below are some coding programs to implement in your classroom. This summer I will be offering a session that is entirely dedicated to coding resources to use in your room. If you have any questions about implementing coding in your classroom contact me.

Congratulations goes out to Carol Kline, SEC at Fairland.  She had the winning essay submitted for this month's Crayola’s Color Alive System. In her essay she shared her plans to use the Crayola coloring program as a supplement to the social skills program- (Superheros Social Skills) - the support team is using at Fairland.

Sending a HUGE THANK YOU to everyone who helped with the STEM Item Donations: Thank you all for your generous donations of all the items I had requested from my last blog or message in the Staff News at IU13. We have used so many of the items so far and I am ready for the rest of my February lessons. Thank you again. I also want to also thank those that emailed me about Art of Recycle in Ephrata. I had known about this amazing place where I also get items for my STEM lessons. I have some new items that I am in need of now for March lessons. I have plenty of items that I had requested before.

I hope you enjoyed the SuperBowl- well at least some of the good commercials:)