July 4th, 2011

P7-S1 A Glowing Transition with Scratch

Brian Clark

Comments: none Tags: Tags: Consolarium, Glow, Scratch, slf11, transition
 : Categories Consolarium, Glow, cross-curricular, games design

p7-S1 Transition

On the last Tuesday of the term, I was able to talk with pupils from Loriston and Kirkhill primary schools over Glow Meet about their P7-S1 transition project. Along with Charleston and Abbotswell primary schools, all primary 7 pupils studied Healthy Living as the basis of a transition project to Kincorth Academy.  This is a little taster of what went on during the project.  You will be able to find out more at SLF 2011 on Thursday 22 September, 1.15pm at this seminar.

Creating ….

Using a dedicated glow group, pupils from all schools were asked to design and upload a flyer to promote healthy living to a document store.  All pupils had access to these stores and were encouraged to look at others work and leave comments. However, flyers were not the only media that the pupils created and shared.

Learn more about this project

Using Glow

My ex Consolarium colleague, Charlie Love, spent time with all 4 primary schools, giving them all an overview and a few lessons on using Scratch to create games.  They also used the tutorials available in the Consolarium Glow Group, as well as looked at remixing projects from the Scratch website.

The pupils were incredibly motivated and challenged by the this activity and they told me in the meeting that while it was hard to do the programming, they worked through the problems as groups.  If they couldn’t find a solution, they used a forum within Glow to ask for help / get feedback from their classmates / peers in another school / a teacher.

These games were also uploaded to the Glow group for feedback from other schools.  One of the boys in Kirkhill primary school told me that the feedback he got back via glow helped him make his game more playable.  This was echoed by pupils at Loriston primary school.

All pupils found the the online community a valuable source of help and feedback, but would of liked to have Mr Love there in person more often to help out with any problems they had.  However, by not having he expert on hand, meant the the pupils did have to seek alternative help.  As well as the online Glow community, in many cases, some pupils who really got into the game design / scratch projects,  became the in-class expert that many pupils turned to for help.

You can play some of the games online at the Scratch website here, or, if you have a Glow account, visit the glow group and see all games and flyers here.

Within the group, pupils from P7 and the secondary schools were encouraged to use a forum to discuss any questions / fears they may have about coming up to the Academy as well as seek help with their Scratch Projects.

You can find out more about this transition project, its links to CfE, use of Glow and their first experience of Game Design at SLF 2011 – sign up here.

June 9th, 2011

Scratch Game Design LIVE on GlowTV

Brian Clark

Comments: none Tags: Tags: cfe, Consolarium, cpd, curriculum for excellence, gamedesign, gaming, Glow, glowtv, Scratch
 : Categories Consolarium, Curriculum for Excellence, Glow, games design

Many of the CPD opportunities Charlie Love and myself have offered over the last 18 months have been based on using Scratch to engage learners and teachers with some hands on game design activities.  Particularly in primary schools.  However, is difficult to work with ALL the schools we are invited to. Enter GlowTV….

GlowTV

At 11am on Wednesday 22nd June, we will be running an online workshop on game design with Scratch via GlowTV.  This session is an introduction to Scratch for creating games and will take you through the Scratch interface and simple programming. During the broadcast we will make a fully working game.  You will be amazed at what you can do in so little time! Ideally suited for CfE levels 2 and 3 for both staff and pupils. You can watch the broadcast and build the game along with it if you want.

Support materials for the game we will make on the day will be available via the Consolarium glow group for use during and after.  More details on this early next week.

You will also be able to ask questions during the session and we will try and answer them for you.

Get Involved!

1. Sign up for GlowTV

2. Register for the session – make sure to use the hashtag #glowtv3

3. If you want to build the game along with the broadcast, you will need Scratch installed on your computer.  Download Scratch here for free from http://scratch.mit.edu

We are looking forward to seeing you on the 22nd!  Why not check out the other forthcoming GlowTV events and even think about getting involved yourself!

June 3rd, 2011

Using Hardware Devices with Scratch/BYOB

Brian Clark

Comments: 1 Comment Tags: Tags: byob, cfe, Consolarium, controller, game based learning, games, games design, Kinect, microphone, programming, ps3, Scratch, xbox
 : Categories Added Value, Consolarium, games design

As part of the game design work the Consolarium have been carrying out, we often visit subject leaders meetings and are invited to ISIS days to do some CPD with staff. Recently, I visited a group of computing teachers in Ayr to take them through possible uses of BYOB in their Computing courses as a follow on / extension to Scratch. The session was well received and the teachers seemed quite inspired to take BYOB forward in their schools. However, it was perhaps the use of external devices with Scratch or BYOB that really caught their eye.

Scratch 1.4 and BYOB have the ability to interact with external hardware such as Picoboards through the sensor options. However, it’s not just Picoboards that can interact with Scratch.

Lego Wedo

The Lego Wedo sensors and motors can also be used with the sensors. In particular, the LEGO® WeDo™ Robotics Motion Sensor and the LEGO® WeDo™ Robotics Tilt Sensor can be used to detect the outside world. Note – a Lego Power Functions Extension Wire and Lego USB hub are also required.

What’s really interesting about this in terms of the gaming world is that there is potential for pupils to use these sensors to build their own controller for a game – perhaps linking up with Design and Technology / 3D Modelling courses to design and build their own controllers that could house the lego sensors. I demonstrated about this at a Teachmeet last year.

Kinect

Then we come to the Kinect. Yes, the Microsoft Kinect Motion Sensor can be used with Scratch! Stephen Howell took some time to get the Kinect sensor to interact and work with Scratch as an input device. Watch his demo below:

Scratch and Kinect from Stephen Howell on Vimeo.

Find out how to do this on Stephen’s blog. I have used Stephen’s program and was really engaged and excited by it. I think it would make Game Design with Scratch even more attractive and challenging for our learners.

Console Controllers

If our learners are creating games with Scratch, why not get them to play/control their games with their own console controllers? There are many controller mapping programs available for PC and Mac that will allow users to map their keyboard and mouse presses to a controller. So, if our pupils create a game that uses the arrow keys to move, why not map the arrow keys to the controller allowing the player to use hardware that they are familiar with, that sits within their own cultural domain, to play the game?

Microphone

Finally, what about other modes of control? The sensor blocks in Scratch have a loudness command. Could we challenge our learners to create a game that responds to noise levels? For example, consider this:

Using the loudness sensor we can control the left / right movement of the rocket.

Overall….

While Scratch and BYOB are not specifically deigned to create games, they are often used for this task as they offer a friendly, easy to use environment. However, by using additional gaming hardware, we can create a learning environment that should hopefully resonate with our pupils and encourage them to engage with the game design process further.

February 24th, 2011

Game To Learn Conference – Afternoon Workshops

Brian Clark

Comments: 1 Comment Tags: Tags: byob, cfe, flash, game based learning, game design, gametolearn, GBL, geocaching, Just Dance, Kodu, Scratch
 : Categories Conferences, Consolarium, game based learning, games design

Wow!  What a response we have had to our Game To Learn afternoon practical workshops!  More than half are fully booked and only a few spaces left in the others!  As you can see from the table below, we’ve had great interest in our Game Design work shops that focus on Scratch, Build Your Own Blocks, Kodu, RPG Maker VX and 2Simple’s Purple Mash /2DIY as well as Thinkworlds 3D environment building session.

This demonstrates just how keen educators are in Scotland to equip themselves with skills to deliver  the Game Design CfE outcomes in their classrooms. What is even more great to see is that it’s not just Computing teachers taking advantage of the sessions, but practioners from all over the curriculum – secondary and primary.

The three sessions that still have spaces in them promise to  be an engaging experience for everyone involved.

1. For those who want to do some Game Design CPD, then the Flash for Schools workshop is for you. [ workshop 7 ]
2. For those who wish to look at non-game design activities, then the Geocaching workshop will see you go on a hi tech treasure hunt around the fair city of Dundee led by our own Ollie Bray. [ workshop 9 ]
3. If you fancy staying indoors, then check out Derek Robertson and Fiona Ferrie’s Just Dance workshop and see how you can get the whole school active. [ workshop 10 ]
   You may want to consider attending the session 4 in the morning to see the impact Just Dance has had in Doon Academy.  Again, be quick as this morning session is filling up too!

NB – We will keep you updated via this blog and twitter (follow @gametolearn and the hashtag #gametolearn) should we receive any cancelations or find some more space in any of the full workshops.

January 12th, 2011

Competition Winners – AnEmaSha

Brian Clark

Comments: 1 Comment Tags: Tags: #dgd, Competitions, games design, Scratch
 : Categories SLF10, games design

In February last year we launched the first LTS Consolarium Games Design Competition and the level of interest from teachers and learners across Scotland was fantastic. When the competition closed on September 3rd 2010, we were very impressed by the quality of the entries and the professional manner in which entrants had prepared their games. We’ve now made arrangements for these games to be hosted online and for you to download them so lets have a little look at what made these games so good and what they are all about in this series of three blogs posts.

AnEmSha

Uh-oh! AnEmSha has crash landed on Earth on her way home! Can you help her gather all the parts of her spaceship from different environments around the world, avoid the dangers that lurk in the forests and oceans of the Earth and keep her energy up by eating the right sort of food? If you are up for the challenge, then this Scratch game is for you. AnEmSha is the product of three pupils from Shapinsay Primary School in Orkney. It was submitted as a group entry for our Game Design Competition and was judged the best in its category.

Learn more about this project

The reasons we liked this game

All three pupils had specific and detailed roles during the project – project manager, programmer and designer. The project was started in school, but most of the communication was done via Glow and email in the learners own time at home with the girls sending each other sprites, ideas, versions of the game and feedback.

The game itself has elements that are found in the most popular and successful adventure games today such as

• Clearly defined user instructions
• Introduction animation to set the scene
• All original artwork and sprite animations
• Ability to ‘skip’ levels if you have the correct code
• 5 levels to work your way though – each with appropriate backgrounds and enemies.
• Cut scenes between levels 3 and 4
• A winning state (AnEmSha gets to fly home) or a losing state (if you get caught by one of the creatures)
• Instructions for animation, scoring, energy, movement and level progression all coded in the Scratch environment.

This type of activity really engages pupils with Game Design. This project has demonstrated that the 3 gilrs are TOPCODERs!

• Target Setting set their own objectives / defining the project
• Organisation people and time management skills
• Peer / Self Assessment what did we do well? How could we make it better? What do we need to do next?
• Collaborative Working communicate using variety of media
• Ongoing Evaluation develop quality control mechanisms for the game eg repeat[create,share, feedback, improve ]
• Develop / Share Skills learn new or improve existing skills in IT, art and design and teamwork
• Encourage investigation “I wonder how I would do ….”

All the Winners

Primary Group Winner – AnEmSha
Secondary Group Winners – Islands of Elemental Evil
Secondary Individual Winner – T. Greep and Co.

December 1st, 2010

A Snow Day Resource from the Consolarium

Brian Clark

Comments: 2 Comments » Tags: Tags: cfe, Consolarium, curriculum for excellence, LTS, Scratch, snow, snowday, tutorials
 : Categories Consolarium, Glow, game based learning, games design

It’s cold out there. Really cold. And snowy.  

With many of Scotland’s schools remaining closed due to bad weather, a large number of teachers, schools and authorities are trying to deliver some engaging snow related learning experiences for learners via Glow.

We have just created a short Snow Globe animation task using Scratch that can be accessed by all Glow users here.  It’s also more than suitable for using with your classes in school too!

Learners with access to Glow will be able to follow the video tutorials to create the animation shown below.  Click the green flag to see the animation!

UPDATE! Tutorial Videos Now On YouTube

The video playlist is embedded below, or you can access on YouTube directly here

November 29th, 2010

Scratch – itching for more?

Brian Clark

Comments: 5 Comments » Tags: Tags: build your own blocks, byob, cfe, computing, Consolarium, curriculum for excellence, game design, games design, GBL, LTS, network games, Scratch
 : Categories Added Value, Consolarium, Glow, games design

Build Your Own Blocks

MIT’s Scratch program has become a firm favourite in Primary and Secondary schools all over Scotland.  It is a great tool to create a variety of interactive media resources such as games, art, simulations and stories.  You are only limited by your imagination!

However, as more and more pupils are experiencing Scratch in their Primary classes or through their own curiosity at home, many secondary subjects that currently use Scratch (usually Computing departments) may be wondering how to build on these skills gained pre-secondary school.

One opportunity for extending the learning opportunities with Scratch lies with the BYOB mod of Scratch.  BYOB has all the features of the regular Scratch program, but has a couple of very exciting extras.  Including:

1. the ability to build custom blocks 
2. use recursion
3. create first class lists and procedures
4. ability to share sprites over a LAN
5. ability to pass variables over a LAN

For the purpose of this post, I would like to demonstrate points 4 and 5 – the ability to pass information between 2 or more computers.  Lets look at an example:

The BYOB software, used in this way, provides us with a tool for learners that immediately promotes, and indeed requires, cooperative working and discussion.  Charlie and myself have been demoing this implementation with Computing teachers at CPD events over Scotland in the last month or so.  We have been delighted to see the discussion and cooperative working that needs to take place in order for learners to create what is,essentially, a multiplayer networked game.

Using the technique above of hosting a mesh and reading in variable data using the sensing option, user can quite quickly create a 2 player tennis style game as illustrated below.

These videos are a little rough around the edges, but I intend to re-do them as a set of tutorial videos to be hosted within our game design Glow group. This tutorial set will take users through the steps to make the tennis game.

Please get in touch if you have already been using BYOB with your classes and share your experience with us.

November 23rd, 2007

ICET 2007: Useful Scratch resource

Derek Robertson

Comments: none Tags: Tags: ICET2007, Scratch
 : Categories games design

I met a very interesting teacher at the conference who was giving a presentation and running a workshop. Mike Leishman is a computer teacher at Newman College in Perth, Australia and his presentation was about how he is using Web 2.0 applications in his school. His post-conference workshop was about how to programme with Scratch. You may not have been able to make this workshop but Mike has made tutorials available via one of the wikis that he is using. His Kids Programming wiki has tutorials in Scratch and other languages so feel free to dip in and see what’s available. If you can contribute to this wiki then Mike has given me the password to share with you. It is ecawa.

Thanks for this very useful resource Mike.