Community Herald: Learning code is cool

Tech savvy Rachel Aaron and Gab White, Co-Leads of the Halifax Chapter of Ladies Learning Code are excited to engage girls ages eight to 13 at upcoming Learning Code event and say they want girls to know “coding is cool.”

Sandwich the message between a <strong> code and it reads bold and clear.

That’s a message Rachel Aaron says she wants to deliver to girls eight-to-13-years-old on Sat. Nov. 8th, when Ladies Learning Code, a national non-profit organization, hosts its first Halifax event geared towards girls.

Intro to HTML & CSS in Halifax is part of National Girls Learning Code Day, sponsored across Canada by MasterCard. Aaron co-leads the Halifax Chapter and says it’s been a long time coming. “All of the mom’s that have come to our workshops over the last year-and-a-half, have been asking when we are going to do something for girls … something they can do with their daughters,” says Aaron. “We’re so excited to finally have this event.”

The free workshop is a full day working with mentors and learning the fundamentals of building a website through a mix of hands-on learning and games that reinforce the concepts. HTML, or hypertext markup language, lays the foundation of content on the worldwide web and CSS, or Cascading Style Sheets, essentially makes it pretty.

“The amazing thing about making websites is children can make it anything they want it to be,” says Aaron. “When I was a kid I was really into scrapbooking. I would cut pictures out and paste them in a physical book. They can do this with their website.”

Targeting children as young as eight-years-old, introduces a behind-the-scenes look at technology, at an age when kids can learn language quickly, says Gab White, the second Halifax co-lead of Ladies Learning Code. A graphic designer and developer, White says learning as young as eight, can sometimes be easier than starting at 12-years-old.

Aaron says by age eight, children have the fundamental math concepts helpful for understanding coding.

“It gives you a really good idea of how technology works,” says Aaron. “In the next 10 or 15 years, learning to code is going to be the same as learning how to read,” she explains. “It’s a fundamental skill linked to the technology everyone is using.”

Complete story here.

While enrolment is currently wait listed, information on upcoming workshops is available throughwww.ladieslearningcode.com and to sign up as a mentor or join the waitlist, see Girls Learning Code Day: Intro to HTML & CSS in Halifax! on EventBrite.ca.

Commmunity Herald: Lights off, green on!

The energy dashboard is lit and students at Prince Andrew High School in Dartmouth are making the connection between their power to reduce power, for a better future.

Grade 11 Prince Andrew High School students Sara Sheydaei and Fatemeh Saadat at the school’s energy dashboard showing by 11:15 a.m. on Wed. Oct. 8 the school has already used enough water to fill 43 bathtubs. (L-R)

“Maybe the next generation of schools and maybe even PA will start to incorporate things like solar panels and micro wind turbines and you may even see some schools into net metering into the grid at some point,” said Energy Minister Andrew Younger.

Students, teachers and energy officials helped launch the first of 40 energy dashboards to be completely operational by the end of this school year.  As part of the Lights Off – Green On! energy efficiency initiative, 90 schools are preparing to install the real-time dashboards by 2017, plugging in HRSB students and staff to their direct impact on energy, water and gas consumption.

The energy dashboard shows the school’s water consumption in terms of how many bathtubs have been filled by 11 a.m.

“Right now we’re lighting 6,664 light bulbs,” explained Lee Anne Amaral, Vice Principal at Prince Andrew.  It’s 11:15 a.m. on Wed. Oct. 8 and the school is in full energy mode and the dashboard shows they’ve already used enough water to fill 43 bathtubs. The dashboard has been aptly placed in a freshly painted bright green trophy case outside the cafeteria, the perfect location, she says, to invoke conversations about electricity demand.

Vice principal Lee Anne Amaral says one of the biggest differences noticed, is the high electricity consumed on weekends. “It raises questions about electricity usage and what can we do to help out,” she says.

“We have more than 900 students.  They’ll come down and look at the dashboard … they’ll look at the weather and once you get to the bars you can see a comparison of one week to another,” says Amaral.

She says a PD Day last week sparked great curiosity amongst the students.  “I probably had 30 students here wondering why we didn’t use water last Monday … I asked them, did none of you use the bathroom?” she laughs.

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Click the pict to take a peak at Prince Andrew’s dashboard:

 

Community Herald: Why not walk to school?

Basinview Drive Community School students Kate, Rory and Gillian participating in the launch of International walk to school month (IWALK) on Oct. 2 and say they enjoy walking to school, “rain or snow.”

October is International Walk to School Month and students at Basinview Drive Community School took to the sunny streets of Bedford on Oct. 2 for the official launch.

Amidst morning commuters, yellow buses and early autumn sunshine, students shuffled their way to the LeBrun Centre and Atwood Terrace cul-de-sac, to make the walk along with school principal Ken Marchand and a few teachers.

“We walk to school everyday in any weather … but not hail or lightning storms,” says grade six student Gillian and her sister Rory.  Their friend Kate says her walk usually takes about 20 mins.  “We like walking to school, but not really in the winter because it’s cold,” smiles Gillian.

Kothai Kumanan made a special drive to get her kids to the IWALK launch.  She lives at the other end of Bedford and her children are usually bussed.  “If I could walk more, I would,” says her grade four daughter, Meera O’Neill.

Students from Basinview Drive Community School in Bedford gather to launch International walk to school month (IWALK), including Leah Castel with her children Mitchell and Jane.

International Walk to School Month (IWALK) aims to encourage students to walk to school as an active healthy living and sustainable transportation activity. Hosted by Halifax Regional School Board, along with the Halifax Regional Policy, Halifax Municipality, RCMP, the Ecology Action Centre and Child Safety Link, Trish Smith of HRSB says, “it is also an opportunity to promote road safety for both pedestrians and motorists.”

Basinview Drive Community School is one of Ecology Action Centre’s travel planning schools and Janet Barlow says they’ve created an active transportation plan for the school community and have been putting place initiatives to try and get more kids walking and biking to school.

“We try to walk as often as we can and we often bring a couple other children along,” says Leah Castel.  Her children, Jane and Mitchell walk about a kilometre and half everyday.  “It takes about 25 mins.  We bundle up and we go … October is a great month because you’re not overheating and it’s a great way to start the day with fresh air, activity and it gets the brain started … and it gets the dog walked!”

About 400 students, or two-thirds of the student population are walkers, according to Marchand, who joined the event.  “There are routes and pathways throughout the community and parents tend to walk with their kids … they have conversations with their children, find rocks and it provides fond memories for children and their parents,” says Marchand.

Click here for Community Herald story.

Top three mission of IWALK, according to Janet Barlow at Ecology Action Centre:

1. It’s about the environment: “We care about reducing the amount of cars on the road, air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions that come from that, and biking and walking is one way to do that.”
2. It’s about safety: “Pedestrian safety is a big issue in Halifax, especially around crosswalks.  We want to make it safe for kids to do this.”
3. It’s about physical activity: “Our kids don’t get enough physical activity and the walk to and from school each day can actually provide a large portion of the daily physical activity recommendation, which is about 60 mins.”

Community Herald: Baseball without borders

 

Ambassadors for baseball in Nova Scotia, children from Fall River, Sackville, Hammonds Plains and Halifax are excited for the 2015 Canada – Cuba Goodwill Tour in Feb. Rachel Crawford, Emily MacFadyen, Lauren Sweet, Grace Hartling, Emilie Leger and Erin Cowan (Back Row L-R). Camden Rendell, Kyle Hunt, Ryan Trenholm and Emily Cahill (Front Row L-R) Photo: Cyndi Sweeney

Local baseball players are returning to Cuba for the 2015 Canada – Cuba Goodwill Tour in February, but this year, girls will join the boys as ambassadors of the Nova Scotia baseball community.

“It’s about encouraging other kids down there, girls in particular, that baseball’s a great sport and there’s great opportunities with it,” says Mike Crawford, head coach of Hammonds Plains 11U “A” team.

But it’s not all about baseball. More than 200 players travelling to Cuba throughout the month of Feb. will have the opportunity to visit the local school in Matanzas, play baseball with local children and deliver school and baseball supplies.

“We’ll probably be contributing more than $60,000 worth of gear to Matanzas baseball program this year with all the teams that are going,” says Dennis Woodworth, the program development team lead.

Only 40 mins. from the resort village of Varadero, Woodworth says Matanzas is a huge baseball community and provides a safe environment for the players.

“Every team goes for a week and they play four-to-five games. We do a school visit every week and our goal is to donate between $4,000 and $5,000 in school supplies,” says Woodworth, who’s been coaching ball since 1987.

Woodworth coordinates the trips from beginning to end and says the idea was sparked in Varadero three years ago when he was given an opportunity to play ball with other baseball enthusiasts, but wanted to take it a step further.

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