Third day of 8th grade Technology/Design class, Move Project Day I

The beauty of teaching the same class multiple times is that I can improve my lesson each time I reteach it.  Today I taught the same lesson (Move Project, Day 1) three times.  The lesson is a part of a two day project.  The final project should look like this example:



Yesterday I taught this lesson two times.  After teaching the class a second time I had a comfortable rhythm of teaching it and understood how much could be completed in the given time of the class.

Students familiarizing themselves with the Scratch interface,
8th grade class, August 15, 2014

The session involved getting to know the Scratch interface and beginning to program.  Again, I focused on the words "Interface, program, programming, sprite and background".  The goal was for the students to familiarize themselves with the Scratch interface and it's tools.  In addition, they learned to form programs and to understand the different uses of the block categories.  Motion, and Control were the ones we focused on for this part of the project.

I was very pleased to see the students get really passionate about their sprite drawings and programming the movement of their sprite.  Here are some of the drawings the students made today:

Sprite and background drawing, 8th grader,
August 15, 2014

Sprite and background drawing, 8th grader,
August 15, 2014

Sprite and background drawing, 8th grader,
August 15, 2014

It always amazes me to see that every group of students I teach has a different vibe to them.  One class is super interested in drawing and designing animations.  Another one is very into programming video games only.  I find it to be an fun challenge to address all of the different needs of the groups; to teach them while keeping them engaged, is the balance that I always try to achieve as a teacher.

One important factor that I include in every class is a recap on what they learned in the previous class and a reflection on what they learned that day.  Normally it is done verbally but in one class I managed to get them to write it down.  Here is one students comment on the last class they had with me:

Student reflection on last class, 8th grader,
August 15, 2014

Next lesson they will program the changing of the costumes of the sprite so that they can control the movement of it's limbs.  I am confident they will be happy with their finished projects and I cannot wait to see them.