CSTA Sacramento

Hello, 

I have been interested in collaboration with our group but it's been very quiet in here so I decided to reach out in hopes of spiking new conversations in our Sacramento group.

I'll start with an introduction. I've been trying to break into CS since about 2019. At that time I ran an after school coding club. I got involved with CAforCS, but because I was a special education teacher I was limited. I managed through prior work experience to get a CTE credential in 2023, but my district was slow about adopting CS…actually they haven't really. I could never get into a position to teach computer science. So my little after school club for students in grades 3 thru 5 continued. 

Someone turned me on to the Golden State Teacher Grant which I was able to use to add a general education multiple subjects credential. Of course now it's 2024 and grant money to add a CS authorization started drying up and I had just finished clearing a multiple subjects credential and clearing my CTE credential so that I wouldn't lose the latter.

At this point CSforCA is still around but not as active for newcomers. If you weren't already in… you weren't getting in as easily. The grant money for the most part was gone for adding a CS authorization for free and my district isn't currently recruiting for CS teachers. If I pay for it I may never get to use it and since I have a clear CTE credential I don't think I need the CS other than to be able to say Yay…finally!!!!

I still love computer science. I'm looking for community. I will be starting my 3rd year as a gen ed. teacher m, after being a special education teacher for 16 years and I couldn't be happier. I will be teaching 5th grade next year up from 3rd. I lived 3rd but not are they needy. I incorporate as much CS into my curriculum as possible. I love STEM. I incorporate plugged and unplugged activities in my classroom lessons several times a week. I am participating in Raspberry PI's summer AI course. Since I use AI quite a bit to help with planning and creating lessons, I want to find a safe way to use it with students without teaching them how to solely rely on it. I got involved with the Build the Change Community through Lego. I was also fortunate enough to get 5 brand new Spike Lego kits for my after school club, which now this will be my 8th year running and oh yeah….. Yay?.,, Lego is discontinuing the Spike kits for a new hands-on learning platform called Lego Education Computer Science & AI. That's okay. We'll still use what I have while I work on getting new kits in the future. 

So enough about me. How's everyone doing? What's your story, or should say stories?