The Art of Tinkering: OctoStudio

This piece is part two in a series of five mini-features highlighting how Live Oak's faculty and staff lead and engage in professional development experiences that bring creative, innovative, and impactful learning to Live Oak students and the broader independent school community. These were originally published in the spring 2024 issue of Live Oak Magazine.

By: Kelley Plasterer, Fifth Grade Teacher

The Exploratorium professional development focused around the app OctoStudio , which is an iPad version of the coding platform Scratch by MIT.? I was interested in the OctoStudio app as it is a great project at the end of each of our science units for students to create a visual model of what they learned. The Exploratorium has so many engaged enthusiastic educators on their team and it was exciting to “nerd out” a bit. I liked the community and got some great ideas to bring back to my classroom. We have been using OctoStudio more frequently, either as an academic choice option, or as an option for some science projects.

It is easy to pick up without a coding background and is a great introduction to coding. It helps boost some of the software engineering interest in students at a very accessible level. Students can quickly feel like they created something with code, and can show their thinking and understanding about topics like the ecosystem and the environment in a new way. The app was easy to understand, so I am able to play more of a facilitator role when giving it to students instead of having all the answers. It is a great way for students and faculty to construct their own meaning.