Robin's First Class

August 25, 2009
Class 1: I drove to Aurora Hills Middle School, arriving at 1:15 pm. From the beginning of my observation, the students were excited & happy to be involved: jumping up & down in their seats, talking to neighbors about the games, etc. The first class had experienced a day’s delay because of the faulty survey link. They were doing the survey when I got there. The students were mostly Hispanic & black, with a few Caucasian girls. While the students completed the survey, Elisa, Robin & myself walked around making sure that no one needed help. One student asked me if the question about previous game classes included the one they were now taking. I told him no. But to me this type of question suggests that the students were really reading & answering the questions honestly. After the survey, Robin took the students through the process of setting up a folder where they could save their work. Most of the students were too excited to keep paying attention. This made the lesson take longer. They asked Robin questions about how the games could be played, whether they could save their games to CDs or data sticks, etc. Then Robin started their first lesson … nouns = agents; verbs = actions of the agents. She showed them the depiction box on a projector screen & how to use it. Once she had made sure they had a basic understanding of drawing an agent, they were on their own with the three of us walking around in case anyone had problems with the depiction box or needed additional information. Then the students had a very short amount of time to begin their own frog. It was difficult to get the students to stop drawing when the class was over. I had taken the media consent forms for their parents, so I could take photos of the students using Agentsheets. I told them that I wanted to take their pictures for our research project. The pictures would be available to other students and participants of the projects. So when I came back at the end of the week, I’d only be able to take pictures of the students who had returned their forms! Every student asked for a form.

Class 2: Robin’s second class started arriving while the first students were still in the process of leaving. This class had been able to access the survey on the first day, as the problem was corrected during the first class. Consequently, this class was a day ahead of the first class. Robin began the class by sending them the link to the Summer Institute Arcade, so they could play some games for themselves. While they played the games, they were animated, happy and concentrating on mastering the games. You could tell whether a student had won, or lost immediately from their exclamations. Most of the students also communicated with their neighbors during this time period. Initially the individual students chose a game to play individually. But as time progressed, I noticed that several students sitting next to each other would have the same game displayed on their computers. Some students helped each other with tips for winning, other students found ways to “cheat” during a game by finding ways to take the frog outside the worksheet, or over barriers that the frog should not have been able to go over. After almost a half hour of game play, Robin instructed the students to continue designing their own agents. I observed the students drawing very unusual frogs of all shapes & colors, a sailboat to substitute for the log, & agents of all kinds, even a fireball. I am always impressed by students’ creativity when they are given free rein to use their own imagination with minimal guidance. All the students were disappointed when the class ended. Robin reassured them that once the arcade was in operation, she would keep the lab open after school on Tuesdays & Wednesdays, so they could continue to either make new games or add new features to already submitted games. Having more time after school to work on their games appeared to increase the students’ positive attitude about their ability to make the game they wanted. The only drawback during this class was trying to get them to make their agents quickly. I’ve never seen so many perfectionists in one class. Robin, Elisa & I walked around the class just in case anyone needed help. Mostly we nagged the students to hurry or they would never have enough time to program the actions! Some asked questions about how they could make a specific effect or correct a mistake. All the students were engaged & thrilled about making their own games. All in all I was impressed with how organized and prepared Robin was, especially with keeping the students focused on the task. Her students were so eager to start designing their own games, the classroom almost vibrated with their energy. I also handed out the media consent forms in the second class with the exact same result. They all wanted to have their pictures taken!