Arriving in Ghana & Computational Thinking with Adinkra Professional Workshop

Arriving in Ghana

The flight from JFK in New York, NY to Accra, Ghana took about ten and a half hours. The time difference is four hours so we departed from JFK at 10:50 pm and arrived in Accra at 1:30 pm. The flight was through Delta airlines. They provided a blanket, pillow, eye mask, ear plugs, headphones, dinner, breakfast, and drinks all complimentary. On the back of every head seat were individual computer screens for travelers pre-downloaded with music, games, movies, and TV shows. I was very pleased with the trip and kept myself easily entertained. Sleeping was very challenging and I actually slept backwards for the brief time that I did. Upon arrival in Accra there is a sign that says Akwaba which is the local language for Welcome. Outside the airport men were playing drums, dancing, and standing on each others heads.

The first place we went from the airport was the cultural market center. 1 US dollar equals 3.35 Ghanaian cedi so shopping here was already one big sale. The Market is filled with high pressure salesmen and women... most of whom welcome you with, "come to my shop. no pressure." I purchased two paintings, one of a bubba tree and the other of Adinkra symbols, and a calabassa, a musical instrument. Purchases required some "negotiating" and was quite fun especially since with the exchange rate most everything was a good deal.

The first night we stayed at the Afia Beach Hotel in Accra which was along the Atlantic Ocean. It was particularly interesting because it either was on or near the Gulf of Guinea which is where the equator crosses the prime meridian. From Accra it was about a six hour ride in a van to the Kumasi Engineering Guest House where I am staying for the duration of the trip. The  ride was a game of avoid the pot holes, avoid the cars, and sometimes avoid the people as there are no sidewalks. The roads will come and go between dirt and road. While driving people would try and sell stuff through the windows and women will carry things on their head; fruit, water bottles, peanuts, etc. After arriving at The Engineering Guest House, or EGH, and settl

ing into my room the work began. 

  



Computational Thinking with Adinkra Workshop

Today my team, consisting of four: Michael, a social science phd student at RPI; Bill, a computer science phd student at RPI, Linda, an eighth grad science teacher; and myself,  hosted a professional development workshop with six teachers at Kumasi High School. The purpose of today’s workshop was to Introduce ICT teachers to CSnap and how computational thinking can be taught with the use of Adinkra. The workshop took place from 12 to 2 with six teachers present.

The workshop first began with answering the questions: What is computer programming? and What is Adinkra Computing? It then moved into computational thinking and Adinkra and what computer topics can be taught through the CSnap Adinkra Computing tool. During the workshop we taught five computer science topics: agile software design, flow of control, looping, variables and conditionals. For four out of five of these topics we used exemplary Adinkra symbols, which they were able to load the scripts for on their computer. I outline these symbols here.

Akoma

Meaning:

Akoma, translated in Akan to “heart”, is suggestive of the spiritual heart, not the physical heart. This symbol represents love, goodwill, patience, faithfulness, and fondness.

Applicable Computer Science Topics:
Flow of Control- The flow of control in a CSnap program starts with the “Flag When Clicked” block, with each code block attached being executed in turn from top to bottom.

CSnap Script to Create Akoma:

Adinkrahene

Meaning:

Adinkrahene, "Chief of the Adinkra symbols", represents greatness and leadership. The symbol of concentric circles was originally on gold medallions worn by "soul washers", officials who performed religious rituals for the chief, such as bathing ceremonial swords. The circles are said to resemble the expanding ripples from a pebble tossed into a pool of water, just as a great leader's influence can ripple across the nation. 

Applicable Computer Science Topics:

Looping- Looping alters the flow of control to repeat small sections of program code.

CSnap Script to Create Akoma:

Akokonan

Meaning:
Akokonan translates as "hen's foot," and it resembles one. The saying that comes with the symbol is "The hen treads on her chicks, but she does not kill them". Thus, it represents the idea of "tough love”, the combination of care and responsibility that we see in good leadership from our own parents or government institutions. 


Applicable Computer Science Topics:

Variables- A variable is a storage location in memory, used during a code execution to reference an established value. In CSnap students can define both local variables for individual Sprites as well as global variables accessible by all Sprites. The scope of a variable refers to when a value stored in a variable is available for use.

Conditionals - Conditionals alter the flow of control to execute a group of code blocks only when an expression evaluates to true.

In addition to variables in Akokonan, conditional control structures can be examined as they are used in the log spiral block to draw Akokonan. The code for the log spiral block can be manipulated to see how conditionals are implemented for clockwise and anticlockwise spiral drawings. To do this, right click on the log spiral block and choose ‘Edit’. A block editor window will open, showing the block definition below. Scroll to the bottom of the block definition window and notice how the ‘if’ control blocks use Boolean logic operators ‘true’ and ‘false’ to determine whether or not the code in the ‘if’ control block should execute._­

CSnap Script to Create Akoma:

Editing the Log Spiral Block: