Welcome Back!

Welcome back to school!  My name is Mrs. Kamenar and I will be working with you this year in your Fundamentals of Programming class.  This year I will begin my tenth year at Waukesha North.  In my time here I have taught a variety of math and computer science classes.  In addition to being a teacher, I am also an assistant women's cross country coach and the school's yearbook advisor.  

I hope that everyone had a fun and relaxing summer vacation!  This summer seemed to go by too fast, but I guess it always seems that way.  I really enjoyed spending my summer with my three year old son, Jack.  We got to spend a lot of time together going to the zoo, swimming, camping in the back yard, reading, and doing other fun things.  My husband and I are expecting our second child at the end of September so I also spent a lot of time preparing for our new arrival.  This means that I intend to take a leave of absence starting at the end of September and I plan to return in mid-November.  Students will be working with another teacher while I am out of the building on maternity leave.  So, we will have about four weeks to get to know each other before I take a leave of absence.

Since I am already talking about taking a leave of absence, we better start learning!  This week we will begin our study of some basic computer programming principles.  One of the first things that we will do is to take a look at Google's Blockly.  This will give us a quick into to some of the basic functions that we will eventually incorporate into our own programs.  We will have an introduction into programming statements, decision making structures, and looping.  Later in the week we will take a look at MIT's free online "Scratch" program where we will learn how to create our own basic program.  Students will also create an online portfolio where we will display all of the work we create over the semester.

I am really excited to get to work with you this year.  I hope we are all able to learn a lot and have some fun along the way!  If you have any questions as we move through the year, please don't hesitate to contact me.