Join us at Picademy @ Google Manchester and become a Certified Educator
Teachers! Become the envy of your maker friends and colleagues by signing up to Picademy@Google Manchester, our free, two-day, professional development experience for professional educators. We will give you the tools and confidence to create inspiring physical computing projects and lessons using the Raspberry Pi.
Thanks to our partnership with Google, the event is free to attend, with lunch included both days, as well as a group dinner on day one. Accommodation and travel is not covered, and will need to be arranged by you or your workplace.
Location: Manchester Central Library
Dates
- 15/16 February 2016
- 01/02 March 2016
- 14/15 March 2016
- 21/22 March 2016
About Picademy
Here’s some video we shot at Picademy Leeds.
https://vimeo.com/136878145
On day one, expect to get stuck in to a range of workshops that introduce you to physical computing by using the General Purpose Input Output (GPIO) pins to control simple electronic components and motors. Explore the camera module attachment, make music with Sonic Pi and terraform the world of Minecraft using the Python programming language.
This is my Traffic Light. There are many others like it, but this one is mine.
However, the real fun begins on day two. It’s now up to you to use your newly learned skills to build your own projects. These typically range from the delightful to the ‘dear-lord-you-made-WHAT-now?’ sort of category. Previous #winning projects have included: killer robots, a ‘weeping angel’ simulator, a mobile phone-controlled car, Christmas jumpers with flashing LEDs, treasure hunts in Minecraft, a speed detector that cheers when you’re running fast enough, and many more. We like our educators to go crazy and flex their creativity muscle. By taking ownership of a project, you reinforce the skills you learned on day one while acquiring new ones such as decomposing problems, testing and debugging, and building resilience.
As a recent Picademy graduate and general Raspberry Pi beginner, I was surprised at how much I picked up on the first day and was able to use in a real project for the final show and tell. Also, you really don’t need to worry about not getting understanding something or making mistakes – everyone is super supportive and will happily go out of their way to help you out. In fact, it’s a really important lesson to learn and pass on: that failing to do something perfectly first time is something to be embraced rather than be afraid of.
By the end of the two days, you leave as a Raspberry Pi Certified Educator, ready to go on and spread your new-found enthusiasm to other educators and, of course, to a whole generation of children. All graduates also get access to post-Picademy support in the form of our exclusive Certified Educator community forums.
A cohort of newly-minted Raspberry Pi Certified Educators.
To apply for this event, visit our Picademy Manchester application page.
14 comments
AndrewS
Great stuff :)
Just out of curiosity, how many Raspberry Pi Certified Educators have you trained up now?
(might be a fun stat to include on https://www.raspberrypi.org/raspberry-pi-certified-educators/ ?)
DC
Hi Raspians! I’d love to get certified. Any chance of streaming your academy? Or offering some other type of correspondence course. I’m in Sydney, Australia. Thanks
HOmer Hazel
Oh Dear, I fear I have to be an ugly American and make a request. On the video many folks were making comments. Could you either turn the background music way down or provide sub-titles. Since I am an American, many of them were very difficult for me to understand.
Sorry. I hope I was the only one.
Jonathan
Hello from the Caribbean,
I have been using Raspberry PI for a few years now and I would like to get certified.
Any chance to attempt to this class via online?
Best regards.
Raspberry Pi Staff James Robinson
Hi Jonathan,
We’d love to be able to offer a live stream of what we do at a picademy, however our training is extremely hands on and currently wouldn’t lend itself to a online course format.
More video content is something we’re looking into.
Kevin Hainsworth
Here’s a ‘Shameless’ plug for Raspberry Jams for those (un)lucky enough not to be educators or not selected for Picademy this time round. Details for both the Preston (01 February) and Manchester (13 February) can be found on Eventbrite. There are other Jams around the country, just Google.
The Manchester 35 Jam is on a Saturday and from my experience it is perfectly OK to stay all day or to just pop your head in during the day to get a feel for what’s going on. No question is too stupid (I have tried on many occasions) and you can be guaranteed to find someone who knows more than you and is willing to share. Its family friendly with a good cross-section of geeks and non-geeks who are all there to learn more. If you are a teacher why not come along and observe how the children of all ages work with RPi. You might even want to test your own projects in a friendly environment before unleashing them on your own students?
Here’s the quote from Frank Gallagher, the King of the Chatsworth Estate and all-round Seer:
“People say the children are the future, teach them well and let them lead the way. But after you’ve had eight of your own, you realise that’s a load of b****cks. Darwin had the right idea; just leave the bu**ers to fend for themselves.”
kind regards.
sham
Hello from Manchester.
I am in quite an awe that the city i live in is hosting these events. I’m very interested in how computers work enjoy spending my time looking up how computer function. I’m intrigued as to how Raspberry Pi works, However I’m not a teacher or have any degree in computer sciences. I know this is a ridiculous question, but would it be possible for me to attend to one of these events even if I’m not a teacher?
Raspberry Pi Staff James Robinson
Hi,
Hi the aim of these courses it’s to provide educators with a starting point for introducing physical and creative computing to their pupils.
If you would like to learn more about computers, how they work and how to program them, why not check out our Education section. It’s full of great resources and projects to get you started.
Juan Mamani
Hi!
Exist any possibility to have access from others continent?
I live in Chile, South America. I would like to get access to this kind of knowledge.
Regards
Juan Mamani
Raspberry Pi Staff James Robinson
We welcome international applications, if you can get to us then consider applying.
We currently have dates for 2 venues, Manchester and the USA. You can find information about both on our Education page.
If you want to keep track of future locations, why not sign up for our Education newsletter.
rkgamer
I decided to teach a raspberry pi club organized by my student council at my school.
Jose
Hello, colleagues!
I am an Spanish teacher willing to get certified. It is impossible for me to make it to this one. Can anyone tell me if there is going to be another Picademy event in April-May this year? I already got funds from my school to make the trip, but I need to start preparing it now
Big hug from the Canary Islands
Jody
Once application is submitted, how long before I should expect to hear if I have been successful or not?
Busana Muslim syari
thk… im from indonesia