Literary Randomizer

• Review the Literary Randomizer lesson in the LEGO® Education SPIKE™ App.
• If necessary, pre-teach these related vocabulary words: genre, overwhelmed, randomizer, and success.
• Consider the abilities and backgrounds of all your students. Differentiate the lesson to make it accessible to everyone. See the Differentiation section below for suggestions.
• If time allows, plan and facilitate the language arts extension. See the Extension section below for more information.

• Facilitate a quick discussion about making decisions.
  • Talk with your students about when they had to make a big decision.
  • Ask questions, like: What criteria did you use to make the decision? How did you evaluate whether you were happy with your decision?
• Introduce your students to the story’s main characters and the first challenge: programming the literary randomizer to pick a book.
• Distribute a brick set and a device to each group.

• Have your students use the LEGO® Education SPIKE™ App to guide them through their first challenge:
  • Create and test the program that picks the book genre.
• Have your students iterate and test their models to complete the next two challenges in the app:
  • Modify the program to improve how the literary randomizer works.
  • Design your own upgraded literary randomizer.
• You can find coding and building support in the Tips section below.

• Gather your students together to reflect on their completed challenges.
• Ask questions, like: What was Daniel’s problem? How did you help solve it? How did you improve Daniel’s literary randomizer? Why did you decide to improve that?

• Prompt your students to discuss and reflect on the process of setting success criteria to determine whether a solution was successful.
• Ask questions, like: Why is it important to set success criteria and understand what makes a solution successful? How do success criteria help you to improve something you've created?
• Have your students clean up their workstations.

• Ask guiding questions to encourage your students to “think aloud” and explain their thought processes and reasoning in the decisions they've made while building and programming.

Observation Checklist

• Measure your students’ proficiency in defining success criteria to evaluate a solution.
• Create a scale that matches your needs. For example:
  1. Needs additional support
  2. Can work independently
  3. Can teach others

Self-Assessment

• Have each student choose the brick that they feel best represents their performance.
  • Yellow: I think I can define the success criteria for evaluating a solution.
  • Blue: I can define the success criteria for evaluating a solution.
  • Green: I can define the success criteria for evaluating a solution, and I can help a friend do it too.

Peer-Feedback

• In their small groups, have your students discuss their experiences working together.
• Encourage them to use statements like these:
  • I liked it when you…
  • I'd like to hear more about how you…

Coding Tip

• After your students complete their first challenge, they'll be provided with three Inspiration Coding Blocks to help them modify their programs.
• The Inspiration Coding Blocks are intended to spark their imaginations as they experiment to find their own solutions.

Model Tip

• After your students complete their second challenge, they’ll be provided with three Inspiration Images and an open-ended prompt for improving their models.
• The Inspiration Images are to help spark their imaginations as they experiment and personalize their models.

There aren't any building instructions for this challenge.

Simplify this lesson by:

• Selecting one Inspiration Image to help your students personalize their models
• Experimenting with either the coding or the building

Increase the difficulty by:

• Changing how the literary randomizer is constructed
• Exploring new and different coding blocks in the program

• Have your students write stories based on the genre chosen by their literary randomizers. Make sure that they use narrative techniques, such as dialogue and description, to create a story that fits the genre.

If facilitated, this will extend beyond the 45-minute lesson.

Language Arts: CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.5.3