Zubi Flyer: Integrating PreK-6 Computer Science Programming
February 05, 2018
The Zubi Flyer from FuzePlay is a STEAM Toy designed for K-12 computer science programming. We FUZE skills gaps by providing an integrated technology platform that universally focuses on developing real-world skill sets aimed at cutting-edge technology.
FuzePlay’s hardware platform FUZE’s play by allowing all online experiences to be taken offline and into the real word, thus creating opportunity for global citizenship and peer-to-peer sharing. Our approach is simple, put futuristic technologies into universal toys and teach through play while leveraging free, open source tools that are familiar to educators and commonly used inside the classroom. We are high-tech for the non-tech and make learning tech as easy as 1, 2, 3, Build Hack Play.
Out of the box you can play frisbee around 12 fun games. Some of these games are memory games, some of these games are sound and music games, and some are light art games. Also included is a magnet wand and two pairs of diffraction glasses. Early learners follow instructions and learn logic and critical thinking through the sequencing of shapes and numbers. Zubi Flyer games are multisensory and designed for physical play. Level up by connecting to Scratch and use Zubi Flyer as a controller for your online interactive Scratch story. After familiarizing kids with text-based language, level up again by connecting Zubi Flyer to Arduino. The code for each Zubi Flyer game can be modified by teacher and student to customize and reinvent game play. Or course, every game can be played by throwing the frisbee with the goal to FUZE physical play and screen time learning.
Recent research supports that physical play increases memory retention and cognitive development. Zubi Flyer’s intuitive shape instantly inspires play around technology in a familiar, but new way that leads innovation. The interface is navigated using simple numbers and shapes relatable to letter recognition and used to navigate in and out of a color coded game menu. Game play presents challenges that engage children and invites a desire to learn computer science concepts.
Games vary in type and difficulty. This allows the parent or teacher flexibility in facilitating each student’s learning experience. Games can be played individually, in a group, inside, or outside. The versatility and open endedness of the product allows teachers to quickly adapt lesson planning using a single tool. In our experience, some teachers will use Zubi Flyer as an achievement based reward and in some cases Zubi Flyer is integrated during the course of normal group lesson plans.
Zubi Flyer is designed for parents, Technology Directors, and Program Coordinators to close skills gaps regardless where faculty or student literacy stands with technology. Additionally, we are exploring how Zubi Flyer fulfills and leads learning goals in autistic learning centers where students may require special needs.
Organizational Leadership is a hot topic across the nation as administrators struggle to accommodate for STEM related programming. All have a myriad of needs and resources. And, most all educators find themselves at a similar starting point summarized well by a recent report showing that 78% of teachers have not received the training necessary to teach with technology.
To ease teacher burdens, Zubi Flyer was designed around free open source tools currently being used in most computer science programs - ScratchJr and Arduino. Our objective was to FUZE skills gaps by providing an integrated technology platform that universally develops real-world skill sets around cutting-edge technology. Our approach to learning is graduated through play and premised on an assumption that the teacher has no previous technical experience. Admins can level up or down CS programming relative to teacher skills and teachers can do the same for students.
Playing with Zubi Flyer Students Will Be Able To (SWBAT) define essential parts of a computer and explain components/features of each, demonstrate algorithmic thinking, use block based programming languages to write simple programs, and reverse engineer an algorithm and write pseudocode for an algorithm. Most important, we FUZE physical play with screen-time learning.
Zubi Flyer graduates learners from logic oriented game play to block based programming and on to text based scripting in an intuitive open source development environment. One example is Name that Tune. Music is played on Zubi Flyer’s 7 octave piezo speaker. Students can access code script for each song, tempo can be changed, and notes added/deleted and transpose a song into digital form for presentation to the class. Taking this a step further, today Zubi Flyer is a frisbee that plays music, tomorrow it is an automated classroom gardening system, or motion sensor alarm. Project possibilities are endless.
After working through Zubi Flyer curriculum teachers and students receive an introduction to computer programming and computational thinking that evolves through applied problem solving and deeper understanding of computing practices, computer components, and programming development environments. Zubi Flyer is the number one solution for a school or district integrating computer science programing.
