Computer Science Education Week in the Lower School
December 9 – 16
This week, across the globe, students of all ages are spending an hour learning to write computer code.
At Friends, our third grade spent their first programming lesson teaching the Scratch cat to dance, talk and transform. Scratch is a graphical language that was developed by Mitch Resnick at MIT.
Our fourth graders, who have been happily programming in Scratch for a while, continued to build their own interactive games. This week they focused on designing mazes and backgrounds. These young programmers need to reason, solve problems and revise.
Both third and fourth graders won’t stop after coding for just an hour. Eventually, third graders will create Scratch animations linked to their studies of the ocean and the Iditarod, and they will construct Lego creatures that are controlled by Scratch. Fourth graders will build increasingly complex games with original music and graphics.
Students can also look forward to Middle and Upper School Computer Science classes, where our technology specialists teach more advanced Scratch, NXT and Processing.
Those parents who want to install Scratch at home can go to the Scratch website. Our third and fourth graders use Scratch version 1.4, which can be downloaded from the site. At home, students may also may want to use the web version, Scratch 2.0, also available there. In order to download Scratch 1.4 or use the online version, elementary school children do not need to join the online Scratch community.
Several creative apps also encourage computational thinking. Hopscotch and Cargot Bot are appropriate for elementary school children.
If you have any questions about coding in the Lower School at Friends, don’t hesitate to contact Judith Seidel, the Lower School Technology Integrator.