Wrangling data with Python

Event Code:  18FTF4NOV30

This workshop is for teachers who already have a solid grasp of basic programming concepts: variables, iteration (loops) and conditionals (if-else statements).

It is targeted at teachers of Years 7-10.

In this workshop, attendees will learn how to import websites, tweets and published books into Python and subsequently analyse the data using a variety of tools.

Outcomes:

Participants will tackle 3 computational thinking problems. By the end of the workshop, they should be able to:

• Install web scraping and Python text analysis modules like Scrapy and TextBlob.
  
• Write Python functions and organise them into a module.
• Analyse tweets, books and blogs for sentiment polarity (the general mood of the text).
• Analyse tweets books and blogs for objectivity (the precise unambiguous use of language).
• Deduce general themes of any piece of text using TextBlob functions.
  

Python is an interpreted text based general purpose programming language and is also the only professional programming language that was designed with beginners in mind; it is intuitive and easy to use.

About the presenter 

Sanjin Dedić has a B.Eng in Mechatronic Systems majoring in Robotics and Computer Vision and spent several years working industry as an Engineer. He then retrained as a teacher and taught Systems Engineering and Digital Technologies at a secondary level. Recently he has been developing a series of technology programs for G.A.T.E.WAYS (gifted and talented education) covering everything from coding, robotics, applied mathematics and microcontrollers. These programs have been delivered to students in Melbourne, Sydney, Canberra and Queensland. As a head of eLearning at Techxellent he has combined his technological expertise with his educational experience to create innovative teacher training programs and resources.