Using Scratch to Teach Programming at the Elementary Level
July 1st, 2008 by Jill25 minutes to start and this session is close to full…
Looks like a pretty even distribution of Macs vs. PCs in the room, maybe a few more Macs.
Christopher Michaud, Nebo Elementary
Music Teacher; next year will also be teaching technology
Presentation and notes are available at http://nebomusic.net/
Why Teach Scratch:
- take students’ sequential and logical thoughts and putting them in a system they can reflect on
- game-making is a form of story-telling
- object-oriented programming avoids typing mistakes and delays
- runs on Mac, Windows or Linux
- encourages open source model
- FREE!
- Programming skills supported and computer science concepts covered (see presentation notes)
I didn’t live-blog this session, as it was a hands-on learning session. It was extremely well-done and fast-paced. I am wracking my brain for where I can use this with my teachers and students! If any of my readers are already using Scratch at the elementary level as part of their core curriculum, I’d love to hear suggestions from you - please comment!
Here is what I created during the session (and worked on about 20 minutes after to teach myself a few more elements):
I can’t express how flooded my brain is with information right now…
Posted in necc2008 |
July 4th, 2008 at 9:45 am
Hey Jill!
Glad to see that someone blogged in a way that’s readable and makes sense!
I stumbled upon Scratch before it was called Scratch and then again last year. My 5th graders were doing science reports on inventors and inventions, so they created a very simple animation demonstrating the invention. One was the chocolate chip cookie…the student made it appears as if the cookie was being eaten over several seconds. I can share more with ya on how I used it in class. -M