Welcome to the 2015-2016 School Year!

Welcome back to school!  My name is Mrs. Kamenar and I will be working with you in your computer class class this year.  This will be my eleventh year teaching at Waukesha North.  This year I will be teaching Honors Geometry, Fundamentals of Programming, Programming the Web 1 & 2 and Yearbook.  In addition to teaching at North, I am also an assistant women's cross country coach and the school's yearbook advisor.

I hope that everyone had an enjoyable and relaxing summer.  This summer went by too fast, but I guess it always seems that way.  This summer I got to spend a lot of time with my husband and my two kids, Jack and Laura.  We spent our time going to the zoo, the children's museum, going to the library and swimming.  My husband and I took a few days to visit Hawaii where we were able to visit Pearl Harbor and have a lot of fun in the ocean snorkeling, kayaking, and cliff jumping.

My goal is to keep you up to date with what's going on in the classroom through this blog.  Between the blog and our class schedule of events that will be posted on our BlackBoard class website, it is my hope that all students and parents will be informed about what's going on in the classroom.

Fundamentals of Programming
In this course, students will be introduced to computer programming through MIT's App Inventor.  We will learn how to program some basic apps that are compatible with Android devices.  This week students will set up their free MIT App Inventor accounts, design our online learning portfolios, and program the "Hello Purr" app.  Through this "drag and drop" based programming environment, students will be introduced to the building blocks of computer programming.

Programming the Web 1
In this course, students will learn how to create and design web pages using HTML5 and CSS.  This course, which is offered as a transcripted course through WCTC, allows students to simultaneously earn high school credit through Waukesha North and college credit through WCTC.  The course is broken down into weekly lessons.  Each week students will be introduced to a new web design technique.  We will talk about the new concept in class and try out a sample together.  Students will receive a programming assignment which consists of between 1 and 4 web sites for the week.  Early in the semester, many of the assignments are presented as step-by-step tutorials from our class textbook.  Students will also need to read an assigned portion of the textbook and take a weekly assessment.

In this first week of class, we will talk about different methods of web design.  Students will look at existing web pages online and analyze the design.  Along with this week, we will see our largest reading assignment for the semester.  Students must read the first three chapters of the textbook in order to prepare for our first assessment.  Students will be provided a "reading guide" to accompany the text so that they can pick out the most important information.

Programming the Web 2
In this course, students will continue to learn about the principles of web design.  This course will include concepts such as advanced HTML5/CSS techniques, JavaScript and animation.  We will start the year with a review of some of the concepts learning in the Programming the Web 1 course.  Students will also start to build their web portfolios that will serve as the foundation for the entire course.

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.

What's Going On? December 15h through December 19th.

Flow of Control

This week we will be wrapping up our unit on the "Flow of Control".  Students have investigated different ways to alter the order in which coding statements are executed.  We have investigated if..else statements, while loops, and for loops.  Over the last two weeks we focused heavily on reading and writing while and for loops.

Students should be prepared to complete a summative assessment at the end of the week.  Two review assignments have been posted to the BlackBoard class website and will help students to prepare for the test.  Students will have some work time to complete the assigned programming projects and will participate in a class review.  Students who have questions can come see me before or after school for extra help.  I just ask that students let me know when to expect them so we can avoid any scheduling conflicts.

What's Going On? September 29th through October 3rd

Variables and Objects

Last week we finished up our unit on the basics of Java programming.  Students were introduced to some of the basic principles of Java programming.  We talked about the different types of errors we may encounter as we learn to program and we learned about the basic structure of a Java application.

So far we've only been able to write very simple programs that print out a couple of lines of text.  In this next unit we'll start to use different variables and objects in order to make our programs more interactive.  This week we'll start working with four different primitive data types:

• int: a variable to hold a whole number
• double: a variable to hold a decimal number
• char: a variable to hold a single character
• boolean: a variable to hold a true/false value

We will become familiar with some basic arithmetic operations and practice the order of operations that our Java applications will follow.  In addition to creating our own variables, we'll also be able to get input from our program's user by using the "Scanner" object.  

What's Going On? September 22nd through September 26th

Intro to Java


This week will will continue our introduction to the Java computer programming language.  Since we are still having technical issues with our JGrasp software, students will be using an online Java compiler.  We will continue looking at basic Java programming syntax and the basic structure for the main method of a Java application.  

This week, students will apply their knowledge learned so far to create some text output.  By the end of the week, students should complete Programming Projects 1.1 and 1.2 as well as Programming Projects 1.3, 1.4 and 1.5.  Students should keep up to date with their Google Site Portfolio page and have these programming assignments added to their portfolios by the end of the week.

Students are reminded that class will meet in lab 300 this week and next week due to MAP testing!

On Thursday students will complete their test review assignment and on Friday student will complete their first summative assessment on the "Basics of Java".  Students are reminded that summative assessments now make up 100% of their grade.

If students have questions, they can come see me for extra help.  I am currently available starting at 7am each morning until I go on maternity leave.  Once I am on maternity leave, students can make arrangements with our long-term substitute, Mrs. Rahn, for extra help.

What's Going On? September 15th-September 19th

Name Animation Tutorial


This week in Fundamentals of Programming students will start off the week by finishing up their Scratch Name Animation Tutorial.  Students will add a new page to their electronic portfolio in order to showcase the knowledge gained while completing the tutorial.

Hopefully our technological difficulties will be resolved this week and we will be able to start making our transition into the Java programming language.  The plan is to compare what we've learned with the block-based coding with the Java.  We'll start by creating a basic program that will print a message.  By the end of the week students should have an understanding of the basic structure of a Java application file as well as an understanding of how to make text appear on the screen.

What's Going On? September 7 - September 11

Intro to Computer Programming: Scratch
This week we'll continue our look at our first programming assignment using MIT's Scratch program.  Last week we set up our free Scratch accounts and started our first "dancing" tutorial.  This week we'll finish up our tutorial and add our program to our portfolio website.  We will also answer some reflection questions related to our program on our portfolio site.

Later this week we'll start connecting what we have learned so far with Scratch to the Java programming language.  We will explore the JGrasp programming environment and create our first basic Java program.

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.