Collaborative learning in the classroom takes place when students work together to understand a common learning concept and complete a task given to them. Students, bank upon each other’s resources, expertise, and skills to fulfill what is expected of them.
Here at Kodecoon Academy, we strongly believe in honing collaborative learning skills amongst our students. Coding should not be a silo affair. Collaborative work enables students to practice their cross-training, problem-solving, and communication skills. They even get to bounce ideas off each other!
We take it upon ourselves to coach and train students to be active participators in group activities and support one another when faced with challenges. Our students are strongly encouraged to work in teams and join forces to facilitate the sharing of ideas and gain understanding from their peers. After all, we all know the saying, teamwork makes the dream work!
With regards to this, Kodecoon Academy is tremendously proud to announce that together with his team, our student, Lee Zhi Yong Isaac Evan was awarded not just one but two awards in the 3D-Tronics Micro-controller Challenge 2022!
What is the competition about?
The 3D-Tronics Micro-controller Challenge 2022 is an annual coding competition organized by Zenitant and Tinkercademy. There are 2 categories: Junior and Senior. The junior category is open for participants from primary schools (age 7-12) and the senior category is open for participants in secondary schools as well as tertiary education.
This 3D-Tronics Challenge aims for students to showcase their skills in coding, digital making and problem-solving. Participants will work in teams of 4 to create a project themed: Making use of Technology to Build Resilience in a Covid Endemic Singapore. They will be required to implement a micro-controller such as a Micro-bit to create a prototype that will address a problem related to the theme. Students are then required to submit their final product by sending in their codes and a video presentation.
Like you, we were eager to find out the students’ overall experience taking part in this challenge. We got our all-time favorite Teacher Deddy to interview Isaac as a representative of his team – after his mummy shared with us his team had been awarded the Godzilla Award as well as the Craftsperson Award. Let’s read what Isaac has to say about the 3D-Tronics competition!
Hi Isaac, tell us about yourself.
My name is Isaac, I am currently Primary 5, studying in White Sands Primary School. I am a member of White Sands Primary’s Infocomm CCA. I am also a student of Kodecoon and am currently learning Machine Learning in Python with Teacher Lucas!
What have you learned in your Infocom CCA?
We learn Scratch as well as Micro:bit and use block-based programming to code our projects.
Tell us a bit more about your experience in the Infocomm CCA.
I have a pretty good experience in this CCA as I learn coding-related concepts alongside my friends. Since I am experienced and have a coding background as I learned most of the concepts in Kodecoon classes, I absorb the content fast!
What have you learned in Kodecoon Academy so far?
I attended Kodecoon Academy for my coding classes and have been attending for the past 5 and a half years. So far, I have learned Scratch Coder, App Inventor, which is mobile apps development with MIT AppInventor, Web Creator, which is web programming with HTML, CSS and JavaScript, as well as Python Coder. Currently, I am learning Machine Learning in Python with Teacher Lucas!
Out of all the programming modules you have taken, which is your favorite?
Learning Scratch was the most fun in my opinion as it is the most user-friendly. However, it is sometimes looked down upon by professionals since it is block-based and you don’t have to type long scripts to have your project working. I find learning Scratch enjoyable as it allows for my imagination to run wild!
Let’s go back to your coding experience at school. You mentioned you learned Micro:bit in your CCA. Could you explain what a Micro:bit is?
A Micro:bit is a tiny programmable computer made and developed by BBC. It has 2 buttons, a few sensors including a buzzer and 25 LED display lights. For Micro:bit coding, we use a block-based coding platform by Microsoft called MakeCode.
Are Micro:bit and Scratch programming similar?
A Micro:-bit, in my opinion, has insufficient functionalities as it only has 2 buttons, a few sensors, and 25 LED lights which I find limiting. Whereas Scratch programming, has no limits and your imagination is the limit! To put things simply, one is limited by the hardware while the other is like a blank piece of drawing block!
What award did your team win?
My team won 2 awards in the 3d-Tronics competition. It is a Micro:bit project themed: Technology to Build Resilience in a Covid Endemic Singapore.
(Isaac’s dad chimed in at this point, “Godzilla Award as well as the Craftsperson Award!”)
What was your project about?
Together as a team, we created what we call an Omin Bot 22. This was designed to aid the food and beverage industry during the Covid-19 pandemic as many restaurants had to exercise safe distancing and their businesses were affected as a result. We wanted to think of how they can maximize their customers with this limitation. The Omni Bot 22 was primarily made to let patrons and shop owners keep track of dining time and sanitize their hands. This helps businesses to ensure dining time limits are enforced and remind customers if they are about to dine past the designated time limit to avoid a longer turnover time.
So, this robot helps restaurants to have to avoid chasing customers away. They get to retain their service levels while at the same time maximizing their profits by a steady turnaround time. Can you tell us why was it named Omni Bot 22?
Yes! We named it Omni Bot 22 as we wanted to keep the name relevant to the omicron variant that was found in 2022.
What were some challenges you faced while doing this project?
Firstly, the lack of time was something we had to consider as a team and in fact, we were aiming to add on more extensions to the Micro:bit if time allowed us to do so. We even wanted to add a temperature scanner and a huskylens to detect and check the temperature and also aimed for a Micro:bit-powered hand sanitizer but due to time constraints, we ended up using a normal automated sanitizer.
We also faced several coding errors as well and needed guidance and assistance from our teacher. My group mates and I persevered through the challenges and learned from our mistakes in order for us to move forward with this competition.
Did skills learned in Kodecoon help you for this competition?
I would say yes as Kodecoon has allowed me to understand different blocks of codes and helped me understand math-related concepts in block-based courses as well as while learning Python. The presentation skills also came in handy and made me portray myself confidently.
What was your role in the team?
I was the lead coder in my team as I had the most experience in coding compared to my group members. We also had a video presentation to submit and I learned most of my presentation skills from Kodecoon lessons.
So you’re the most confident one on the team! How did u get into this 3D-Tronics competition?
My school selected me and my team members to join this 3D-Tronics challenge. This is a group challenge and my teacher grouped us. We worked on each other’s strengths and learnedt to cooperate. Sometimes we had different ideas on the prototype that we were building but we managed to compromise and come to agreements.
Can you tell us what are the 2 awards you won? What are they about?
Our team won the Godzilla award as well as the Craftsperson Award!
Godzilla Award: Biggest/Tallest Project: a constructed project that’s at least 20cm tall or wide, with a good reason for its size (you cannot just attach a micro-controller to cardboard)
Craftsperson Award: Most hand-made and fewest pre-fabricated* parts as possible. (*Prefabs are parts that are designed by someone else, bought and used off-the-shelf.) You must show evidence of your design process through photos, sketches, or CAD.
Did u expect the team to win these awards?
I was expecting to win only one award related to the project. My groupmates on the other hand were greatly discouraged as by the looks of it, our project was not appealing to the judges’ eyes. But I am really happy that we won not one but 2 awards and our efforts were not in vain!
How did you feel about getting these awards?
I felt very elated and happy that our efforts had paid off and felt immensely proud of having won 2 awards out of the 10. My school managed to win 4 out of 10 awards in this competition and I was certainly proud of this win!
Who did you turn to for advice when faced with challenges?
I sought help from Teacher Deddy at certain times when I struggled with the coding portion of building Omni Bot 22. With Teacher Deddy’s advice, I implemented some of the ideas that ended up become beneficial to our end product. Many prototypes were mainly inspired by Teacher Deddy’s suggestions as he guided me through good and bad ideas for improving the project.
Any advice to your fellow peers who are eager to code but have yet to start?
If you think coding is interesting and want to have fun while learning it, don’t wait, code with Kodecoon!
Lastly, would you like to give a shoutout or special thank you to anyone?
I would like to convey special thanks to my school White Sands Primary School and my School teachers: Ms Tan and Mrs wong for selecting me and giving me this opportunity to take part in this prestigious competition.
I would also like to thank my fellow team members, for being a great sport for working with me on this project and for winning 2 awards!
Thank you to mummy and daddy for giving me the support, love, and courage to persevere through my coding journey.
Lastly, thank you to Kodecoon for teaching me and allowing me to discover my love and passion for coding!
Kodecoon Academy congratulates Isaac on his success in the 3D-Tronics Challenge and wish to see Isaac achieve bigger and greater awards in his coding journey. Well Done Isaac!! Other than this competition, in our own Kodecoon curriculum, Isaac has created numerous projects aimed to solve community problems. One of his proudest projects was his MIT AppInvetor mobile app, Help Ears, which was designed to be a translator. It is targeted at those with hearing or speech disabilities. With a speech to text function and vice versa, this app is created with hopes that they can ease into the society with the help of technology.
Congratulations once again! We are proud of you!
At Kodecoon Academy, our mission is to help develop critical thinking skills and help our children of tomorrow channel their creativity to transform ideas into concrete realities! We wish to shape more young talents to be tech-savvy, team-spirited learners in the field of STEM.
Contact us to register for our FREE Scratch Coder trial classes and meet our instructors to learn more about how you can kickstart your child’s coding journey with us! You can also check out a brief introduction of our trial class process here for more information!