Raspberry Pi in Northampton

A informal, but heavily over-subscribed (15 places but around 70 people registered interest), Raspberry Pi  event for  teachers and STEM ambassador was held at the University of Northampton on 16th October 2013. A collaboration between the Department of Computing and Immersive Technologies, University of Northampton; LEBC (who support STEM activities within Northamptonshire and Milton Keynes through the STEM ambassador); with support from BCS Northampton through the loan on the night of some extra equipment.

The session was meant to be (and I hope was) a chance to exchange ideas for teachers and ambassadors; set-up and try out Raspberry Pis; try a little Scratch or Python programming and to start up a discussion across the area what can be done (and is being done) with Raspberry Pi. Nigel Barrett (Corby Technical School) and Scott Turner (University of Northampton) facilitated the groups, with support from Julie Messenger and other LEBC staff.

Some interesting resources were highlighted

• The MagPi magazine a free to download magazine with some interesting things to do with the RaspberryPi.
• ScoopIts on Physical Computing
• how to find the operating system on-line; download and install the operating system on to a SD Card http://learn.adafruit.com/downloads/pdf/adafruit-raspberry-pi-lesson-1-preparing-and-sd-card-for-your-raspberry-pi.pdf by Simon Monk and the main download site for Raspberry PI OS http://www.raspberrypi.org/downloads
• Setting up the Raspberry PI including selecting basic configuration settings:      http://learn.adafruit.com/downloads/pdf/adafruits-raspberry-pi-lesson-2-first-time-configuration.pdf 
• Interesting article on Raspberry and Minecraft (again from MagPi)
• There is even and on-line teacher's resource and the main resource the student's book on combining Python, Raspberry Pi, and Minecraft.

opinion: Good time for teaching computer science

In the last few months there have been some changes to the suggested curriculum in schools that will be pleasing to those interested in Computing and what is being taught in UK schools.

With Computing added to the National Curriculum for England and Wales for Key Stage 1 to 3. The draft Curriculum (see http://media.education.gov.uk/assets/files/pdf/n/national%20curriculum%20consultation%20-%20framework%20document.pdf) on page 152-156 has Computer Science at its core and ICT  longer offered as an initial teacher training (ITT) teaching subject (see the UK Government's own website: Department of Education (2012) for more details). 

This "approach to rigorous computer science teaching in schools is supported by The British Computing Society (BCS – The Chartered Institute for IT), along with Microsoft, Google and Facebook" (Department of Education, 2012). Evidence of this is the BCS has partnered with the Teaching Agency to offer £20000 Teaching Scholarships (BCS, 2012). This scholarship scheme is backed by several large computing-related companies (including Microsoft, BT and Facebook)  "to be part of a range of activities that nurture future computer science Master Teachers who will lead innovation both within their own school and in collaboration with other schools"  BCS (2012)


The application form for the Teaching Scholarship can be found at: https://apps.bcs.org/Scholarship/


To take this further, there is ample evidence that Universities, including University of Northampton, are serious about helping schools with computing. For example:

• computing helps school (http://computingnorthampton.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/computing-helps-school.html)
• computing students and public engagement skills (http://computingnorthampton.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/computing-students-and-public.html);
• the junkbots project http://junkbots.blogspot.co.uk/.

To learn more about how The School of Science and Technology, University of Northampton can help schools contact scott.turner@northampton.ac.uk or stem@northampton.ac.uk


References
Department of Education (2012) "Become a computer science teacher" [online] URL: http://www.education.gov.uk/get-into-teaching/subjects-age-groups/computer-science.aspx [accessed on: 16th February 2013].
BCS (2012) "Teaching scholarships" [online] URL: http://academy.bcs.org/scholarships [accessed on: 16th February 2013].

BSc and HND Computing Provision (click on the links below for more details of the courses)

• BSc (Hons) Computing (also available part-time)
• BSc (Hons) Computing (Computer Networks Engineering)
• BSc (Hons) Computing (Computer Systems Engineering)
• BSc (Hons) Computing (Graphics and Visualisation)
• BSc (Hons) Computing (Internet Technology and Security)
• BSc (Hons) Computing (Mobile Computing)
• BSc (Hons) Computing (Software Engineering)
• BSc (Hons) Computing - One Year Top-up
• BSc  Computer Games Development
• HNC Computing (part-time)
• HND Computing (Computer Networks Engineering)
• HND Computing (Computer Systems Engineering)
• HND Computing (Graphics and Visualisation)
• HND Computing (Internet Technology and Security)
• HND Computing (Mobile Computing)
• HND Computing (Software Engineering) 
• HND Computing
• HND Computer Games Development

The University of Northampton's, Department of Computing and Immersive Technologies offers five courses within the MSc Computing postgraduate provision (shown below) all available either part-time or full-time. 

• MSc Computing
• MSc Computing (Internet Technology and Security)
• MSc Computing (Computer Networks Engineering)
• MSc Computing (Software Engineering)
• MSc Computing (Immersive Technologies)