Teaching students about drones can be done even if you do not have an actual aircraft to fly. Many school districts are providing drones for teachers to use as an educational tool. But what if you are not that fortunate? Or what if your students need activities to do while they await their designated flight […]
Teaching Students About Drones Read More »
Do your students want to make a truly one-of-a-kind Scratch project? Or are they having trouble finding just the right main character or object in the Sprite Library? One option is to use the Paint Editor tools to create your own. But if you are in a hurry, or lack artistic skills like me, you
How to: Upload a Sprite for Scratch Read More »
To personalize a game or story, you can import a sound into Scratch. It is true that Scratch, has more than 350 sounds. That is a lot of effects and music from which to pick! However, your students may want to produce a unique game by downloading sounds from an external source. This allows them
How to Import a Sound into Scratch Read More »
Consider phases of game development when planning a programming curriculum unit. This framework provides a learning experience that simulates the real-world. For this reason, divide game development tasks into three phases: pre-production, production, and post-production. Now, it is important to realize that there is little agreement on how many phases are in game development. Some
Get to Know the Three Phases of Game Development Read More »
Games should be fun and just the right level of challenge. They shouldn’t be too easy, so that the player finishes quickly and has no incentive to play again. And games should not be too hard. Then the player may give up and abandon play. One way to inspire and motivate players is to script
Game Development: How to Script Obstacles Read More »
Design thinking careers are everywhere. If you are an educator, it is essential that you prepare students for their future. It is likely their future career may require them to be design thinkers. Design thinking is a model used by organizations when performing creative problem-solving. It has five steps including emphasize, define, ideate, prototype, and
Why Not Help Students Get Design Thinking Careers? Read More »
Teachers, are you searching for an all new artificial intelligence curriculum for middle school or high school grades? If yes, TechnoKids has just released TechnoBot AI. In this technology project students become artificial intelligence specialists. They invent AI prototypes using Scratch. The assignments are ideal for Grades 6-12 or ages 10-18. TechnoBot AI is Artificial
All New Artificial Intelligence Curriculum for Middle School Read More »
Teachers, are you assessing your students’ Scratch coding projects? How do you know that they understand the code that they have written? Here’s a quick tip to have your students demonstrate their learning: ask them to write brief comment notes in Scratch. In this way, they will confirm that they recognize the function of the
How To Add Comments To Scratch Coding Projects Read More »
Do you need practical tips to create a project-based curriculum unit that follows a design thinking model? This post provides activities for each of the five steps including empathize, define, ideate, prototype, and test. All ideas are for children and will fit easily into your lesson plans. To start, let’s review the purpose of design
Practical Tips to Plan a Curriculum Unit With a Design Thinking Model Read More »
If you are teaching a game development or coding unit, you may want to know how to build player controls in Scratch. The good news is that it is easy to have the player move around the stage using arrow keys. Discover the blocks you will need, sample scripts, and time saving tips. Why Build
How to Build Game Player Controls in Scratch Read More »
