Challenges of a trip
Publication date: October 20, 2021
by Erviola Konomi, Leading teacher. School “Zhani Ciko”, Albania
I am Erviola Konomi, from Albania, Code Week Leading teacher for 3 years. During these years I and my students have learned and enjoyed very much during unplugged or online coding events.
Our school “Zhani Ciko” is an eTwinning school and collaborative school.
As a mathematics teacher, I apply different and innovative methods in my teaching to encourage pupils to think critically. Pupils, in response, are very friendly and creative.
Coding week at the “Zhani Ciko” school has already become an annual tradition. This is because gamification impacts our pupils’ critical thinking, communication and above all, is fun!
Since we are an eTwinning School, we have collaborated with various schools on eTwinning projects related to coding. We are also the winner of various eTwinning competitions, at Scientix, on the Edu-Arctic platform.
In October 2019, some of our pupils were invited to the Mediterranean Energy Debate MED in Brussels where they discussed renewable energy efficiency, in European Week of Regions and Cities. This made them feel motivated. And in 2020, the coding activity “Let’s code, and stay safe online” was presented at the Stem Discovery Week Contest and was one of the winning activities.
This year, our kids, taking into account the global issues on climate change, created an ecological city that was again the winner for STEM Discovery Week 2021. So, they wanted to create a coding activity on this issue.
The title of the activity is: “Challenges towards the ecological city”
The contest:
The game starts from our city Fier, (an Albanian city) in the direction of the alternative ticket selected A or B.
If ticket A is chosen, the destination is, for example, the city of Shkodra. Else if ticket is B, the destination is Vlora.
➡️ Shkodra city – the game challenge in MAZE, (students can create their Maze game with different roadblocks for different levels) at the end of the labyrinth there is ticket A (Vlora), else if student does not choose ticket A, then ticket choice is B (Tirana).
⤴️City of Tirana – Challenge: find the minimum number of paving stones that need to be used so that you can get from any house to any other house. In the end the city is written, and the destination of the movement (Ticket A Vlora/country X or Ticket B Shkodra/ country Y).
↪City of Vlora —- Challenge: the game in the puzzle game. If the emoji comes out 🙂, the player goes to the city on the Durres, if the emoji is ☹ student returns to the city in Start (Fier city).
⤵️Durres city/ County T — Challenge: message in bottle. A challenge awaits them in this city: to decode the message in the bottle, which will orient the player to the next destination, Tirana or Berat city.
↗️City of Berat/ County M —- Challenge: to complete cryptographic input-output -for example with input code 001000 find the output code 001010- . If the player does it correctly, then they will choose the ticket A that leads them to the Ecological City, if not, they choose ticket B, and returns to Start, at Fier city.
🔄 City of Fier. — Challenge: quizzes.
If the student answers correctly, then gets the ticket A that takes them to Berat/County Z, if they do not answer correctly, get the ticket B that takes them to Tirana/country S.
While the student continues the journey, a student of the class writes on the blackboard the itinerary that the student has followed and the number of routes to the end of the journey.
(Challenges can be different in each city, they can be quizzes with information on the culture and tradition of each city, or coding games.)
