Scratch parrot animation

Today, we found the Scratch animation programme online and mandy went through it on the board step by step (which i found a lot easier to understand than copying a handbook!) I then looked through the different images and picked a monkey, chose a nature/park bench background then programmed it to walk a few steps, jump on the table and look excited/ However, Mandy and i then discovered that the functions were complicated compared to other images. So, i then changed the image to a parrot, did the same actions then have the parrot then for it to make a sound. Overall, i enjoyed this Scratch lesson a lot more than the last one for sure!

Scratch

I would describe Scratch as a sort of game that you can play on the computer, which consists of programming stories, games, animations etc. The age group would be roughly between 8 and 16 years.

"Scratch helps young people learn to think creatively, reason systematically, and work collaboratively; which are essential skills for life in the 21st century" (Scratch website)

It is used in education all over the world and is cross curricular, you can incorporate it into science, maths, English and obviously I.T.


Mandy showed us an introduction video to it, although I was familiar with it as they talked about it in Technocamps. She then gave us a step by step guide and we had to create our own animation based on set instructions.

I have to say that at first I found it really difficult, could not grasp it at all! It took me quite a while to understand the steps involved, but as I got it I found it easier to do it. I still found it hard but I understood the point of it and the outcome.

Scratch is a very useful tool to use throughout the curriculum and increases a child's computer literacy greatly!