Drum roll, please! We’re thrilled to announce the winners of our first-ever MAD-app Contest! Our team had the pleasure of reviewing an inspiring collection of student-created apps, and we were blown away by the creativity and innovation on display.
Please join us in congratulating the three winning apps—listed in no particular order, because they’re all winners in our eyes!
A huge shoutout to the talented students and dedicated teachers who brought these incredible ideas to life. (Teachers, if your students’ app is listed below, we’ll be reaching out to you this week!) Winning students will receive a $100 gift card and their teachers will receive a $25 gift card.
App: Our Snack Shack app
School: Wilson Tech (NY)
Grade(s): 11th & 12th
Teacher: Victoria McNaughtonStudents: Charlie G., Shawn H. & Eryn N.
This fully-functioning business app is student-run and allows users (students) to place food orders from the school store.
App: DreamDoctors: Dickens Way
School: Barber Middle School (GA)
Grade(s): 7th
Teacher: Saundra Watts Students: Allisyn H.
This biographical app allows users to learn about the life and achievements of Dr. Helen Octavia Dickens (1909-2001), a groundbreaking African American physician who specialized in obstetrics and gynecology. She was the first Black woman admitted to the American College of Surgeons in 1950.
App: Carbon Clearer
School: Mountain View ES (GA)
Grade(s): 5th
Teacher: Dr. Cassondra Zielinski Students: Dhir S.
Carbon Clearer (aka EcoPath) is a simple user friendly app that allows its users to track and decrease/maintain their carbon footprint.
Honorable Mention:
App: School Program APP
School: Kaunakakai Elementary School (HI)
Grade(s): 5th
Teacher: Kawika Gonzales Students: Tehya-Marie D.
The goal of this app is to engage students in class and allow them to have fun. The app includes prompts for storytelling, art activities and games, and movement breaks.
The end of the year is one of those perfect windows to implement mobile app development. In the past week, the MAD-learn team has worked with several teachers to help plan their end-of-year mobile app development projects (we are here to support you throughout the process!).
Middle schoolers in Tricia Glass’s math class at Dickerson Middle School kicked off their app development this week on math units and concepts covered throughout the year (this isn’t our first eacher to create math apps, either! Check out some of 8th grade math teacher Sheri Dennard’s students’ apps that are published on our MAD-store).
We also spoke to Introduction to Business & Technology Gwendolyn Mitchell at McNair High School to plan how her students will spend the last three weeks of the school year creating their own mobile apps with a business focus.
The possibilities are endless, whether you’re creating apps for test review, reinforcing cumulative concepts from the year or having students use app development to share a passion (as an aside, one of our MAD-learn team members had students create their own Ted Talk as a passion project; a mobile app to accompany student speeches would have been the perfect touch!)- or just want students to have the chance for something fun, engaging and hands-on, mobile app development is the perfect end-of-year project for all of it.
Check out this app on order of operations from Tricia Glass’ class, started this week:
As usual, we’re busy this month! Come say hello if you’ll be at NWGA RESA or Cobb In It To Win It on May 29th. We’ll also be at STEMapalooza and would love to meet you. One of our team members is currently facilitating an app camp with students in Coldspring, Texas and we were recently in Las Vegas for the ACTE Region V Conference. Check out our photos below!
Kawika Gonzales is a 5th grade general education teacher, with more than 20 years of classroom experience, who is a passionate advocate for integrating and connecting culture and computer science in elementary classrooms. His 5th grade students at Kaunakakai Elementary School in Hawaii have blown us away with their creative, engaging and well-coded apps! His students began their MAD-learn journey by coding an app that keeps score for Ulu Maika, a Hawaiian sport similar to bowling. They love that they have the opportunity to share their voice, culture and through mobile apps. We love that Kawika has been an advocate for bringing computer science and technology to elementary classrooms!
… checking out this special first-time ever moment for us! Alefiya’s parents and husband were able to join her at ACTE Region V in Las Vegas to see the MAD-learn booth in action and attend one of our sessions live for the first time ever! We’re so lucky to have the support of our family and friends to help us keep doing the things we know our students and teachers need. #HeyLookMaIMadeIt.
