Create a Scratch project that introduces yourself, then share the link and discuss your experience here.
To create a project, go to the new Scratch website, and then click Create.
Here's a short overview:
Here Mitch shows you how to create an intro project in Scratch:
For those who can't access Youtube, here are downloadable versions of the files:
Download video 5: Intro to this week's activity
Download video 6: Introduce yourself on Scratch - Mitch's intro
You can also get ideas and add your project to this studio:
4 of My Favorite Things
http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/19772143/
I added a new panel to reflect my interest in the past year in education. Since this is a remix of last year's project, I made a minor correction to a photo credit. The remix took about three hours to do.
I still have my intro for last LCL. I have added some things to it since then:
http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/3146255/
I also created another intro for this LCL:
Sharing for common interest...
Scratch has been influential on similar teaching tools. See this lesson for example:
http://learn.code.org/s/6/level/148
I moved a post to an existing topic: Week 2 - Readings
Here is my Scratch personal introduction: http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/19811763
It is about 30 seconds long with one sound, one custom background, and motion.
"Howdy!
My name is Blake.
I have red hair and I like SPACE!!!
I usually wear shorts and tshirts.
I'm hungry, lets get some food.
I eat alot of pasta because I run marathons.
I also drink lots of water.
Refreshing!"
Hi!
You can find out what I like to do while you play! http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/19833810/
I've remixed the project I've done the first time : http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/3142628/ (I like to eat cupcakes too 
)
Enjoy!
I am very much a beginner, but thought it’d be fun to make a logic puzzle sort of introduction (even though me posting it actually makes it illogical). http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/19826127/
Then I had fun with stacking blocks to play code in two ways. When I was growing up, we’d play games around the campfire. One ‘code’ game had us watching another person give clues to a word with a stick through various motions and taps on the ground. If you knew they were scratching out the consonants (and you had to keep in mind they might appear upside down or sideways depending on where you were observing), that was helpful. If you knew the number of taps corresponded to a vowel, a=1, e=2 and so on, you appeared brilliant to those who didn’t know the “keys.”
http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/19836596/
I have updated my introductory Scratch Project. This enabled an additional recording with a reflection and some new thoughts.
To see goto: http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/3122640/#player
I have written a blog post about this which can be seen at:
this was fun to use - I used Scratch once a long time ago but never did much with it. Worked out a bit better today. Here is mine: http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/19891743/#player
I haven't made my Intro video yet but as I got a Makey Makey this week, I had to have a play and make a Play-Doh drum kit. I searched for a drum kit program and connected the Makey Makey to it all with Play doh as the keys. 
Here I am.
http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/19907169/
I have mixed feelings about Scratch and have had mixed experiences with kids, too. One one hand, it is a bit cumbersome and not enough "flash" for the effort. But I like the code visibility of it and the ability to teach simple programming.
Kevin
I have Makey Makey in a box and have not yet had time to tinker (I also got some Squishy Circuit material -- also still in its box). Thanks for the photo. I need to get moving on the Make ...
Here is my Scratch project. I dropped the project in the LCL2 - studio, but I spam you here as well...
http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/2966473/
Here is my All About Me project. I created this for a Scratch Day and then remixed it for CCOW and I'm using it again for LCL2.
My wk 2 assignment. Scratch: http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/19922436/
This is my introduction.
http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/19904365/
I started scratch since last LCL1. I enjoyed Learning Creative Learning 1.
During the class, I met many great peaple.
My Introduction:
http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/19916330/
I started with Scratch in the Creative Computing Online Workshop (CCOW) last summer.
Love the Birthday cake and song!
Liked your project. I am also from the Pacific Northwest.
Nice project. I also attended CCOW.
@dogtrax This really ties in with some of what the group talked about in the videos. Scratch is one of my favorite coding tools. But it is a tool, a means to an end. Some projects have better tools for the individual's needs and personal interests. There are other visual-based coding environments like Scratch out there. The learner may do better with a tool that has nothing to do with programming, even if most of the rest of the class is interested in Scratch for their projects. I think it is important to encourage participants to try out a simple introduction to different types of tools and maybe even try simple projects like this week's activity to get an idea of how they might be able to explore it, but when it is time to work on personal projects and focus on individual interests it is good to consider when a learner wants to shelf one tool and pick up a different one.
download the free trial of soundplant It allows you to map a key to a .wav file so that you can program your a,s,d,f,, w, etc... pretty great program.
and here goes my first scratch..
http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/19925612/
Awesome, thanks for that. Will download it this weekend and have a play
Check out my Activity project here!
Check out My Hobbies
I feel like I improve by leaps and bounds every time I make something new on Scratch.
Here's my intro in my first attempt at using Scratch. http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/19891144/
I have now offered Scratch in our Flexitime options at school so looking forward to learning more with our students!
Here is my Scratch Intro project:
http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/19926622/#player
I was at first tempted to use my project from last year's CCOW or a prior About Me project I had made as an example for my students, but I find making Scratch projects fun!
Anders, I really enjoyed your project and your use of Lists. I produced a similar project with lot of dialog. I am now motivated to go back into my project and remix it using Lists.
Thank you Sandy. The best part using Lists are probably that you can import a txt file direct into the list with rightclick. It's easier to write the dialog in Notepad or something.
If you make music, one list could contain notes and one the duration, and then combine the two into music...
I'm glad I inspired you making Lists. 
Here's my scratch introduction.
http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/20000066/
I liked the structure of your Scratch program! I'll definitely do a remix.
I moved a post to a new topic: On being an explorer
Here's my intro project for Week 2: http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/19598241/ It's a maze game that you have to navigate. Behind the numbers you'll either find an unhappy face or you'll find out some info about me. There is a pattern on which numbers have the info about me, but you'll have to figure it out. The game keeps track of the number of lives you have and your score.
I was really keen on learning how to do the score and lives aspect of the game (using variables). Luckily I have a resident programming expert -- my 12 year old son 
There is a lot about the code that I don't fully understand, but I think with more practice I'll get it.
One thing I would like to change is how my project is displayed -- it shows the final screen instead of the maze. If anyone has tips on how to change this, please let me know!
Cheers,
Claire
Hi I'm Vivian. I'm late to join the forums, though I've been following the course from the start. I've been hanging about the Twitter hashtag #lcltalk
Week 1: I wrote about the Learning Spiral and did our assignment here in this blogpost.
Week 2: You'll find my Scratch Project embedded on this blogpost: "Scratch that Low Floor but High Ceiling" I also wrote quite a bit comparing the puzzles-type of "learn to code" programs with "create" types of programs like Scratch. I was completely in agreement (from my personal experiences) with views mentioned in video 3 about the differences between Puzzles & Projects (Creation).
Twitter me @chezvivian
Thanks!
Vivian
I just posted my first ever Scratch project here: http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/19895114/
It's called "The Art of Scratching and Creative Life Lessons." I think of myself more as an artist than a tech person, so I tried to find a way to join the two.
What I found most interesting about the process was how the elements I wanted to create drove what I learned. That is, as I came up with ideas of what I wanted to add, I then dove in and played with the program to figure out how to get it to work. I really felt a powerful sense of intrinsic motivation and interest-driven learning in action.
I hope what I created isn't too far afield from what Scratch is all about. Thanks for a fun exercise!
Here My 1st Scratch...I really enjoyed it! Hope you too!
Just playing around with frustrations with innovation in schools http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/20050704
Having some trouble with playback. Hope it works for you.
I also can't get it to play. You can get help for your scripts in the Scratch Discussion Forum. They are very nice over there. Let me know if you manage to debug it.
Lovely drawing of yourself! I'm a quilter and I love the colours and textures of the bird and the map of Texas. Thanks for sharing!
"Things can be different" I like your conclusion!
Thanks, I've had a look around and couldn't find an answer. I've posted a request for help.
Thank you for taking the time to look at it!
Enjoyed your project! Loved the bubbles at the end.
If you start with the Events Block - When Green flag clicked, otherwise you have to go into the script and doubleclick the stack. But the message you send is really nice, and I think it´s an international struggle for education.
Thank you mfbishop_bishop! Appreciate!
Thank you 1L2P! I tried to resume my life MacGuffin/leitmotiv...
Here it is my intro... http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/19964740/
I loved your message I think many of us here can relate to it, I know I can! I had written the solution to your problem as a comment on Scratch before I saw that @skola2015 had already answered here.
http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/3127303/
After I made this, I spent a lot of time getting frustrated as I tried to make the jostling balls able to move around, bouncing off each other and not necessarily returning to where they started. My programming yielded weird results and I didn't share them. I could do so, but first, let me ask if anyone knows of scratch routine that could get me going in a new (and more productive) direction.
Wow. I had WAY to much fun thinking and reflecting about this experience. Here's my feeble attempt: http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/20060986/#fullscreen
As I did this, I was reminded of learning LOGO in the first grade. I could spend hours and hours just playing and building. I experienced similar frustrations (and satisfactions) of setting out to accomplish something with my "turtle" and trying to figure out how to make it happen! It felt good, but it also reminded me that we need to give ourselves time to just play. It also reminded me how frustrating it can be to want to express/do something but not know "the code." I think this has strong implications for ELL learners. Just TOL here.. 
Check out my introduction project here: http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/20057525/
Building this project taught me a lot about my own learning style. For one, I need to be more patient with myself as I learn new skills. It's easy to get frustrated when you run into barriers, but working through them and solving the problem is rewarding.
Since I'm so new to computer programming, it took a lot of trial and error to figure out the Scratch tools as well as how to bring my ideas to life. Looking at other projects for inspiration and tips was very helpful. I look forwarding to playing around with Scratch more in the future.
I made a remix of it with the event added of "When flag clicked" and it worked fine from there. Love the message - I am working in a new school where we are trying an innovative look at secondary schooling. Even with pick of staff from all over NZ, some of what we are trying is uncomfortable and challenging for teachers!
Interesting insight on the Puzzle-type activities. Here is a short video you may be interested in viewing, @mresmres discusses how Scratch can make variables become meaningful and motivating for the students. I believe this may be taken from his Ted Talk. I have found in my teaching with my students, that Scratch ignites a passion in them. It so exciting to see them wanting to learn and they just can't seem to get enough. They want to create and they see the need to learn the different concepts to bring their visions to life.
One of the great things about Scratch is that we can all look at the code itself and see how it is supposed to work! I second Skola, put a "When Flag Clicked" hat at the top of your code and this will work perfectly.
http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/20059731/
First scratch project had to reference a mushroom!
Just a quick reminder to all, remember to add your project to the studio LCL 2014 : Introduce Yourself if you haven't already! These are all great projects
Here is a link to my intro on Scratch: http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/19953337
http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/19996733/
I had a great time doing this. It was an iterative process and I just kept getting ideas on how I wanted to do it. At one point, I wanted to just copy the script but it wouldn't let me, so I just Googled my question and a link come up that told me about the backpack feature that made it so much easier. I really enjoyed this process.
[Error in posting a reply instead of a new post so deleted and reposted here] Who Am I? I believe I made this last year for the CCOW MOOC, which I found after LCL1. I am excited to post new links but for now here is the old one:
Scratch Intro
Nice! Just a simple "green flag". Thanks everyone. It's amazing how a little thing like this can frustrate you, and just how good it feels when people take the time to lend a hand.
Glad to hear from others who also struggle with innovation in education too. Sorry we're all struggling, but at least we're not alone.
Thanks to fellow LCLers and Scratchers, the simple solution has been provided!
Bonjour, here's my Scratch project introducing myself.
You'll find out how I turned into an "American in Paris" thanks to a couple of well known Media Lab characters. What am I doing in Paris now? That's the question I keep asking myself. This intro tries to provide a bit of an answer.
http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/20000244/#player
Work still in progress. Would like to know how to hide the sprites before the project page loads with the green flag. (Backgrounds maybe?)
You totaled Seymour Papert's Volvo?????
My week 2 scratch project.
http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/19833391/
Philipp (1L2P),
Okay, first of all Seymour's car was really old, so it didn't take that much damage to total it.
Second, he loaned it to me to run an errand in winter.
Third, it wasn't my fault. A gentleman ran a stop sign and rammed me from the side. He wasn't going very fast because, as he pointed out, he had halted at the stop sign and then proceeded from his side street into the snow-packed intersection. Apparently he didn't notice I was on the main street with the right of way. Neither of us could stop in the slick snow, but I still feel bad about it.
I agree with you about the intrinsic motivation. You said:
the elements I wanted to create drove what I learned
I couldn't agree with you more and I think this really is a wonderful strength of Scratch. Tied in with this is the idea of the "low floor" (easy to get started) and "high ceiling" (able to get very complex) of Scratch.
I loved the remix intro. Spent some time remizing the diffferent sounds. Very creative!
I wanted to share a Scratch story. I created my first Scratch project during the first LCL course which can be found here http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/3127789/ . Last week, my brother told me that my nieces, ages 8 & 10, love Scratch. He said, my niece Jenny's dream is to visit the MIT Media Lab. I told them I could show them a video tour by Mitch who created Scratch and they were extremely excited. We watched the video together and they loved it, especially (like me) the silk worm installation in the lobby. Then we shared our Scratch projects. I was so impressed with both of their work and their very clear understanding of remixing. They showed me that they had just created a Chicken Lovers Group and invited me to join. Then they created a Family group for the Scratchers in our family http://scratch.mit.edu/studios/383951/. You can check out their work, Lily, age 8, memowpie http://scratch.mit.edu/users/memowpie/ and Jenny, age 10, PokemonWarriorCats http://scratch.mit.edu/users/PokemonWarriorCats/
I know it sounds horrible, but the only thing that I could think of to tell everyone about myself through my Scratch project was my interest in craft beer. So, I give you The Pursuit of Hoppiness video game. Please don't judge me too harshly.
http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/20105009/
You remind me so much of a professor I know who actually works in Theoretical computer science, but told me, "You know, given a choice I'd do maths clubs and science clubs for high school students all day". As young people who had just finished their Ph.D he often travelled with a group to rural India to "take science to the villages". There was this one time when they were in a village near Kanchipuram to hold a sky show, in May, when Jupiter is easily spotted in the Indian skies. After setting up the telescope and making general announcements about the time of the sky show, they just hung around the village, chatting. At 8 p.m, they were surprised to see that over 50 people had turned up for the sky show, half of whom were children who were running everywhere, accidentally moving the accurately set up telescope, pointed at Jupiter. The crowd was getting impatient and annoyed at every minor adjustment that had to be made, and every extra minute they had to queue up for so that they could look at Jupiter, while half of them did not know what the fuss about that tiny speck was. Somebody then had a brainwave to point the telescope at the moon. The moon is an important part of growing up in India, often used to distract babies into eating. Being something that everyone easily identified with and being a large object that can be easily focussed upon, the simple idea of pointing the telscope at the moon turned the entire event into a huge hit with children running under the starlit sky saying, "Nila kaataraanga, nila kaataraanga"(They're showing the moon, they're showing the moon!").
I really enjoyed your stories. Thanks!
Despite teaching Scratch every year to my fourth graders, I rarely take the time to work on a Scratch project myself. This was an activity that forced me to "get my hands dirty" with Scratch and I had a great time using backgrounds, voice, sprites and animation to make my story. This also helped my teaching this week because I was able to show my students how background changes can help keep the momentum going in a story or animation. They also thought that the cutout of me and my giant hand looked pretty funny up on the screen. I appreciate any feedback! http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/19817081/
Here is my Scratch project. My introduction
Hey! This is my intro!
http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/20059927/
Hello All,
Here is my short intro on Scratch http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/20117477/
Yes, I love that phraseology. Not sure I'll ever get to the high ceiling, but it's great to know the potential is relatively uncapped. I can really see the value of Scratch as a self-driven and peer-inspired learning tool.
Everyone I was working on my Scratch project and I think something's wrong I foun
Hi all! I had a lot of fun revisiting scratch tonight!
My first time making my own drawings in it: http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/20073037/
I shared some information about Agile Project Management here: http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/20129944
I need your inputs - let me know what else you want to know and I will add it to the project.
In my case the chin ddoes all the work http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/20129944/
Excellent project and super interesting stories!
Ok… Here is the link to my Scratch Project. Hope you enjoy!
Thanks for the video. Yes, this is helpful. It would be great to see more material linking Scratch to learning objectives. I know they are there, but for a teacher that doesn't know Scratch, it's not clear what they are and how to use Scratch to address them. I'm sure there are resources out there. I just have to dig in and look for them. Thanks!
Hello!I did my best hope you like it .It´s the first scratch
http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/20048439/
Hello!
A little delayed but not too late, I share a very brief and partial self-presentation as the project exercise for the Week 2 - Activity. Hopefully that pleases at least a little...
What a great and funny intro
Hi Everyone.
I know this comes quite late but if anyone is a bit behind like myself here is my SCRATCH project.
I learned a ton doing this but it took me quite some time. This is likely because I am stubborn, and because I insisted on designing my own Spite which ate up a good chunk of time.
I am having a few issues with the coding in particular in relation to timing of my sprites. I am also having difficultly with the very last bit of code. I wanted to get my sprite to wave. I created 4 sprite each with the hand in a different position and then put in 4 commands for costume changes and wrapped them in a repeat - but it's not working. Any tips would be greatly appreciated.
I am hoping to be able to integrate Scratch into my art practice as I move more towards video work.
Thanks for sharing, I think your artwork is very inspiring and I enjoyed the explanations you included!
James, I really liked your gears Scratch project this year...What I did was click on all the gears one after the other in succession so you were talking about all the gear components at the same time. I don't know why, but I really found that funny and satisfying!
Hi Sandra,
Great first Scratch project. The problem you are having with your wave at the end is that you are not using a wait block between costume switches. Here a screenshot of a fix you may want to try. I took the first costume out of the loop, as I thought it looked more realistic without that costume.
I'm a little late, but I got so engrossed in creating my first Scratch project and spent quite a bit of time doing it! I really enjoyed it. It's not very advanced, but does have quite a few different sprites and scenes. I mostly used changes in back drop colours as events. I am sure there are more elegant ways of doing some of the things that I did, but still need to play around a bit more to do this!
Here's my scratch project: http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/20054468/
Instead of introducing myself, I decided to introduce 4 kids who are quite special to me, called the Thunderbolt Kids! These 4 kids come from the original project called Kusasa, developed in Cape town, South Africa. It's an educational resource aimaed at developing analytical and critical thinking skills, using role models, stories, computer modelling, experiments and lesson plans.
At Siyavula, we obtained the Thunderbolt Kids from the Shuttleworth Foundation and used the 4 kids as guides in our Gr 4-6 openly licensed content for Natural Sciences and Technology, which you can view here: www.thunderboltkids.co.za. This was the content that I developed in 2012, and why I got to know these 4 kids so well
In anticipation of this, I decided to use this opportunity to make a Scratch project to introduce these 4 characters. Have fun!
Hey @meganbeckett - This is so cool. I remember Kusasa from my time in Cape Town (I was a Shuttleworth fellow at the same time as Mark Horner). Great to see the connections that are being made.
The interactivity was great--what a fun intro! I also very much enjoyed the website with the comic adventures--it had some interesting ways to engage and present critical and creative thinking. Thanks for your work!
Thanks! I really had fun making it
Thanks Philip! Yes, I knew you were also a fellow, but wasn't sure when. I'm working at Siyavula now with Mark, doing all the Gr 4-9 content. We have revived the Thunderbolt Kids as Kusasa was such a great project. Doing this course has inspired me to relook at all the Kusasa resources that we have and what we can do with them, and I was actually just chatting to one of our directors yesterday (after I showed him my Scratch project :)) about developing a curriculum for Gr 4-9. I think it could be quite exciting.
http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/20392477/#editor
Let's see if this works:)
Yay!!!!! It did!!!!!
Great work!! I really liked your Scratch!
Thanks so much for your help Sandy!
Hi all! Hope you can learn a little more about me through this(a bit late).
http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/20395778/
-bk
Let me know if you want to move forward with that. I can try to make connections to teachers in the US that have experience with projects like this. I was a Shuttleworth fellow from 2009-2012.
There is no "late" in learning creative learning. Fixing up old Schwinn cruisers? I hope we'll get to see some pictures of those.
Yes please, that would be great! I joined the peer discussion topic on "Tech curriculum" too to get some ideas. But, I am not too sure where to start! My feeling is that we would want to develop a course for kids, but which provides a lot of support to educators in South Africa. Otherwise I think they would feel quite over whelmed and would just stick to the traditional curriculum. Then, as they grow in experience and confidence, they can start adapting the course, also allowing kids to guide what they want to do, as has been suggested before. These are just my initial thoughts. But, what I really need is some guidance on the types of projects and tools that educators are using with kids in this age group, and how to scaffold it through the years. So, if I could get some insight or suggestions from other educators that would be really helpful. My email is megan@siyavula.com. Thanks!
Hello!
Here is my first Scratch Project: http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/20641917/
It took some experimenting and quite some patience and curiosity since I'm not familiar to programming.
It was a fun project and it kept making me want to invest more time. So that's a good thing.
Looking forward to your feedback to improve it and fine tune it.
Thank you.
This was really cool--how nice to include an option for the viewer to add her name. I liked the way you divided up the content and interactivity to keep the viewer engaged.
Thank you. I appreciate the feedback.
Create a Scratch project that introduces yourself and your goals in joining LCL, then share the link and discuss your experience by clicking the reply button on the bottom of this post. If you scroll up, you can see responses from other LCLers, and remember, everyone loves a comment or two!
To create a project, go to the new Scratch website, and then click Create.
Here's a short overview:
Here Mitch shows you how to create an intro project in Scratch:
For those who can't access Youtube, here are downloadable versions of the files:
Download video 5: Intro to this week's activity
Download video 6: Introduce yourself on Scratch - Mitch's intro
Hi Folks,
I played with the scratch this morning using the logo from my website and my banner. My logo is a character so I made that my sprite. I tried out a few features to introduce myself.
http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/33373728/
I hope that you enjoy it.
Barry
PS. I am putting the embed code below, but I think that I am missing something for it to come up here. Suggestions appreciated....
@barrybgelston I think the current installation does not manage iframe embedding
These are great Scratch projects so far!
We've still got the LCL 2014 studio on Scratch:
http://scratch.mit.edu/studios/383246/projects/
Here's a thread in the Ask category if you need help:
Here's my second try with Scratch. I look forward to creating longer productions!
http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/36006214/
lot of fun making this project!!
I found out that in the process of building this project I first choose the picture for the stages and the look of the sprites, only after this step I started to managing the the "timing" variable..it was a challenge to me and took so much time and so much tests ..maybe it's because I'm not so "expert" using scratch. Surelly in the next project I'll pay more attention to that in an earlier step.
Brava @Angelasofia_Lombardo;
If you wish you can add your project to LCL 2014: Introduce Yourself studio
Loved it and the time you took for choosing the pictures paid off, they were stunning and now more then ever I want to travel to Italy and visit your beautiful country. So happy to see you here!!
I loved this project and I really enjoy using Scratch. It's my first time, so the project is simple. Looking forward to getting creative with this tool!
http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/36046742/
What an awesome way to give us a tour of your world! I can see using this with my students.
I had a lot fun playing with this tool for the first time. I feel like there's so much more Scratch can do, but time was limited! I also felt that it was a bit more challenging to figure out then I anticipated. I thought having some development experience would make it easier, but in some ways it became more challenging to figure out how the development instructions translate in this program.
Direct link: http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/36061942/
In Mindstorm Papert make a comparison between learnig to code and learning a new language...maybe as in learning any language, it's better not try to translate??
It will be an honour to me!
I'll be glad if you'll share with me your students projects!!!
This my "Introduce yourself" project: http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/36850282/
Here is my about me project: http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/37143246/. I have tinkered with the code before, it's fun to return to the project because I have learned more about Scratch since the last time I worked on it.
From this week's readings/videos, I really enjoyed Mitch and Nataile's discussion of projects. Mitch's observation that constructionism "It isn't just about constructing things, but constructing things you care about, experimenting, trying new things" was a statement that really stuck with me. In my own development as a teacher, I find myself working to develop project prompts that get closer to my students' interests and curiosity and allow for multiple demonstrations of their understanding.
I work with teachers of all kinds--many from Latin American countries. I tinker around with activities that will help teachers understand this question: What is it like to have a "learning disability?" One of my constraints is to use recycled or simple materials accessible even in rural areas. One of the games I came up with is the following:
The Dyslexia Game
from Dr. Cynthia Herbert, The Foundry, drherbert88@gmail.com
Preparation:
• Have on hand a stopwatch or watch with a second hand.
• Gather 20 bottle caps, buttons, poker chips or other small objects, in two different colors.
• Number the objects in each color from one to ten. Variation: If you have a lot of different small objects or they are not in two colors, stick one of two colors of Avery dots on them before numbering them.
• Put the objects in two vertical lines with the numbers in order. Allow 3 or 4 inches between the two lines.
Rules for Round One:
• Two people play.
• One person will point to the “1” in the first line/color and then to the “1” in the second line/color; the “2” in the first line and then the “2” in the second line—through all the numbers to “10.” They must actually touch each object and say the number as they do so.
• The second person will time and record how many seconds it takes the first person to complete the task.
• Switch roles and repeat.
Rules for Round Two:
• This time the objects in the second line/color should be randomly shaken and dropped. Note: If some objects land upsidedown or backward, just leave them that way.
• Try to play the game the same as in Round One.
Reflect:
• What happened?
• Which round was easier? Why?
• How did you feel doing the second round?
Interpretation:
• Imagine that one line/color is your visual system and the other is your auditory system.
• In order to read, you have to match the visual picture of a word (think of the green line) to its auditory counterpart (think of the white line). This is the essence of phonics. In the game, this is like trying to read a 10 letter word, one letter at a time.
Visual: s c r a m b l i n g
Auditory: /s/ /c/ /r/ /a/ /m/ /b/ /l/ /ĭ/ /ŋ/
• Now imagine that one of your systems is “scrambled.” (Think of Round Two.) No matter how you try, you cannot make the match as quickly as a good reader. There is nothing wrong with your intelligence. You aren’t lazy. As a matter of fact you have to work much, much harder.
• Imagine that after this matching process is completed, you have to put the 10 pieces (letters) together to make a whole (word). How hard is it to keep the sound of piece (letter) “1” in mind as you travel down the line (word)? In Round One, this is do-able. In Round Two, it takes super human effort.
People who have trouble reading are not stupid. People who have trouble reading are not lazy. Their task is simply Herculean!
Hi all
here is my extra short intro: http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/39687598/
just for fun
Hello Chris! I loved the idea of your presentation. Congratulations and keep tinkering!
