​卡尔加里公立教育委员会（CBE）的五所学校的5至9年级学生正在通过CTF加速器计划学习如何创造性地解决问题、获取个人专长并与他人合作实现共同目标。该计划与Mindfuel合作，帮助学生在职业和技术基础（CTF）课程中发展并探索他们的兴趣。

来自乔治·斯坦利博士学校、帕特里克·伯恩斯参议员学校、彼得·劳伊德学校、Twelve Mile Coulee学校和威廉·D.普拉特学校的学生利用快速原型设计，创造了在食品产品设计、3D打印、促进数字素养和重塑社区空间方面的创新解决方案。快速原型设计的理念是通过实践学习，并在每个设计阶段进行增量调整。来自不同职业和创业倡议的导师访问课堂，并帮助学生在项目中学习使用快速原型设计。学生们还在自己的职业领域技能、知识和技术方面发展自己的专业知识。

为了庆祝他们的学习之旅并与更广泛的观众分享他们的想法，学生们参加了在卡尔加里大学举办的展示活动。超过200名卡尔加里大学教授、社区合作伙伴和实习教师出席了该活动，为学生提供听众和反馈。

来自Twelve Mile Coulee学校的学生探索了如何制作快餐小吃。一个团队专注于重新开发波普饼，并受到导师的挑战，用计算思维视角来解决问题。学生们将他们的食谱与计算机代码进行了比较，在每次迭代中，他们必须确定需要重新编程的代码方面。例如，当他们探索如何为草莓馅料创建正确的稠度时，他们调整了代码，包括增加了如玉米淀粉这样的增稠剂，尝试通过脱水改变草莓的处理方式。通过他们的探索，学生们意识到，他们采取的每种方法都会对小吃的纹理产生影响。最终，他们决定使用调味糖晶体来制作他们的产品。

来自乔治·斯坦利博士学校的一组学生通过提出问题“我们如何增加学生对在线危险的意识？”来探索数字素养。他们的方法是创建一个数字选择自己冒险游戏，让学生们揭示他们在线选择的潜在危险。学生们尝试用Scratch编写他们的游戏，通过PowerPoint讲故事，并创建一个基于网络的平台。在每个原型中，团队必须在满足截止日期、产品质量和实现目标的有效性之间取得平衡。他们最终的产品是一个告诉学生为什么某些选择是危险的在线调查。

CTF加速器计划是一个持续的学习计划，向所有CBE教师开放。该计划每年冬季和春季提供。今年的计划得到了EducationMatters的资助。

​Students in Grades 5-9 at five CBE schools are learning how to creatively solve problems, access individual expertise and collaborate with others to achieve common goals through the CTF Accelerator Program. The program, in partnership with Mindfuel, helps students develop and explore their passions within the Career and Technology Foundations (CTF) program of study. 

Students from Dr. George Stanley School, Senator Patrick Burns School, Peter Lougheed School, Twelve Mile Coulee School, and William D. Pratt School used rapid prototyping to create innovative solutions in food product design, 3D printing, promoting digital literacy, and repurposing community spaces. Rapid prototyping is based on the philosophy of learning by doing, and making incremental adjustments through each design stage. Mentors from a variety of different professions and entrepreneurial initiatives visited classrooms and helped students learn to use rapid prototyping on their projects. Students were also developing their expertise in their occupational area skills, knowledge and technologies. School used rapid prototyping to create innovative solutions in food product design, 3D printing, promoting digital literacy, and repurposing community spaces. Rapid prototyping is based on the philosophy of learning by doing, and making incremental adjustments through each design stage. Mentors from a variety of different professions and entrepreneurial initiatives visited classrooms and helped students learn to use rapid prototyping on their projects. Students were also developing their expertise in their occupational area skills, knowledge and technologies.

To celebrate their journey and share their ideas with a larger audience, students participated in a showcase at the University of Calgary. Over 200 U of C professors, community partners and pre-service teachers attended the event to provide an audience and feedback for the students.   

Students from Twelve Mile Coulee School explored how to create fast food snacks. One team focused on re-developing pop-tarts and were challenged by their mentor to approach the problem through a computational thinking lens. Students compared their recipe to a computer code and with each iteration had to determine the aspects of the code that needed reprograming. For example, as they explored how to create the correct consistency for their strawberry filling, they adjusted their code to include thickening agents like cornstarch to changing the preparation of strawberries by trying to dehydrate them. Through their journey, the students realized that every approach they took to make the snack healthier impacted its texture. Ultimately, they settled on using flavoured sugar crystals to create their product. 

A group of students from Dr. George Stanley School explored digital literacy by asking the question, how might we increase students’ awareness of online dangers? Their approach was to create a digital choose your own adventure game that would allow students to uncover the potential dangers of their online choices. Students explored coding their game in Scratch, telling the story through PowerPoint and creating a web based platform. Through each prototype, the team had to balance between meeting a deadline, product quality and effectiveness of achieving their target goal. Their final product is an online survey that tells students why certain choices are dangerous.

The CTF Accelerator Program is an ongoing learning initiative that is open too all CBE teachers. The program is offered in the winter and spring each year. This year’s program is supported through a grant from EducationMatters.