Chapter Two: Behind-the-scenes at Girls’ Geek Day

In this episode, we get behind-the-scenes at Girls' Geek Day hosted at St. Anne's-Belfield School, to find out why girls of all ages want and need this outlet to explore hands-on STEM activities together. Sarah highlights a MUST READ book for Women's History Month! Check out the resources below to bring some Girls' Geek Day activities to your home.

Girls' Geek Day Interviews

Here are the folks we interviewed, in order of appearance:
  • Mom & daughter - Noel Jorgenson and Sammie
  • Session Facilitator - Terry Graff, STEM Teacher Cale Elementary School (host school)
  • Student - Charlotte, Kindergartner at St. Anne's-Belfield School
  • Session Facilitator - Viv, 12th grader at St. Anne's-Belfield School
  • Session Facilitator - Isabel, 9th grader at St. Anne's-Belfield School
  • Dad - Aaron Bloomfield
  • Session Facilitators - Tech-Girls from Western Albemarle High School
  • Session Facilitators - Cale Elementary students
  • Session Facilitator - Katie Breaud, Gifted Resource Teacher at Broadus Wood Elementary School (host school)
  • Student - Willow, Rockfish River Elementary School

Resources

Book of the Month:
Women in Science: 50 Fearless Pioneers Who Changed the World
Behind the Scenes at Girls' Geek Day
Meet the robots: Bee-Bot, Code-a-Pillar, Cublets, Dot & Dash, Finch, Ozobot, Robot Mouse, and Sphero.

BitsBox - is the perfect storm of free, fun and challenging. It’s coding in JavaScript on your computer or tablet which may seem daunting, but the creators really know their audience. They have provided so many engaging sprites, backgrounds and sounds that figuring out a little syntax is worth it to explore all the possibilities. Projects can be saved as apps to share with friends and family! If you enjoy it, there’s a subscription service to receive monthly challenges. Check out this free Hour of Code activity to get started.

Binary Bracelets - one of the fundamental computer science concepts is that everything we do on a computer is really just bits turning on and off. Even though this sounds simple, it can be a concept that is hard to grasp. This fun unplugged activity brings the binary concept to life through math and the creation of binary bracelets. The link also takes you to a variety of CS unplugged activities that you can do with material at home.

#ScratchAtHome - follow along this hashtag to find lots of resources to get started with Scratch (online for computer/tablet or download for computer) and Scratch Jr. (download for tablet). These amazing platforms are free, low floor/high ceiling (which means they are easy to get started with, but offer plenty of challenges) and great online tool that allow kids to unleash their creativity through coding. 
Music credits