Tracy Kite



Tracy's Class Photos

June 11, 2009
How will I introduce the Scalable Design Project: I will introduce the project on Friday before the first lesson by having the students play the frogger game and the bridge builder simulation. Also, prior to my intro to the following week we will take the pre-survey online. Then the following week will be five days long and 45 minutes in length per session.

1.Learning objectives: Students will create a simple but complete version of Frogger game while learning Agentsheets software. Students will apply design process to identify objects "agent" and interactions "Operations" throughout this unit, students will be introduced to basic computatioanl thinking, including basic objectinteraction, stacks, creating object instances rule based programming and message sending.

OVERVIEW: On this day students will create a new worksheet, a frog agent and will be able to move the frog agent in all directions.

2. STANDARDS:
 * #1 apply exisiting knowledge to generate new products
 * #4 plan and manage activites to develop a solution or complete a project
 * 4d use multiple processes and diverse perspective to explore alternative solutions.
 * 6c trouble shoot systems and applications

3. Model the concepts that will be needed. Show frog movement using a student for illustration. Discuss the parts of the program: gallary, worksheet, agents, etc. Discuss grading system and requirements for that session Discuss terms: Absorb, Collision, Generate, Transport Go over the NOUN and Verb scenario to start Programming thoughts. Create a new project and make sure it will be saved correctly Create Frog Create worksheet SAVE worksheet Play / Test: Edit behavior make frog move with arrows Test and SAVE then Close program Discuss what just happened. Look ahead to tomorrow.

DAY 2

Objective is the same as day 1 for the remaining classes. The same is true for the Standards.

Review a students creation from yesterday. Compare this with the completed frogger to get a goal for the final project. Set the goal for completing the road portion of the game for that session.

Review: Gallery, worksheet, agents, and behavior Also terms: absorb, collision, generate, and transport Discuss the nouns and verbs for the days project

Demonstrate how to open the saved project. Have students create a street with three lanes Create a truck and edit the behavior to move from left to right. Use demo first

Play / Test: car just stack up

Check understanding

Create a tunnel agent and program it to generate trucks SAVE worksheet

Demonstrate how to edit the truck behavior to make the trucks disappear on the right side. Play / Test the tunnel behavior Check understanding

Review / restate goal. Look a head to next day... we'll squash the frog with a truck

Day 3

Review a students project from the day before. Compare it to the model to determine what we need to do next. Go over terms, and project requirements. Enhance the verbs and nouns in this days session.

Demo how to open the project and how to modify an exisiting agent. Create the squashed frog. Modify frog behavior to accommodate frog/truck collision check understanding.

SAVE

Check up Pair up and Answer the following after you hit run. see if everything works correctly: If answer to one of these is no, go back to the area and see what needs to be adjusted. Otherwise, GOOD JOB!
 * Does the frog move all directions?
 * Do the trucks get created and erased?
 * Does the Frod-Truck collision work correctly?

Restate scope of project. Next day we will add river, logs and bridges. We will be using the transport computational thinking pattern.

Day 4

Review and compare to completed model for next faze needed: river, logs and bridges

Open projects and have students create log and river agent Spend extensive time with illustrations on the frog and log concept! Modify frog behavior so when the frog jumps into the water he says "Oh NO it's not water!" then a splash sound is played and the frog squashes. Play / Test behavior

Demo how to create bridge as a log generator Play / Test behavior

Discuss on transport for frogs on logs...video is available. Program frog on log behavior Play / Test SAVE

Review, evaluate the progress level for the next day.

Day 5

Review and evaluate a few games. Review terms, and components of the program and computational thinking

Instruct students that they will be using the knowledge that they have gained to create turtles, and turtle generators / Palm trees. The turtles will be going the opposite direction of the trucks and logs.

Give time to do requirement and encourage play / testing

Test your program to see how / if the turtle agent works. In the worksheet window, place two turtle generator agents across from each other on each side of the river Hit play *do turtles get created? *do the turtles move and disappear when they reach the turtle generator agent? *Control the frog and try to jump on a turtle, does the frog move with the turtle?

If it doesn't work...Why? Fix it! If it does Yeah!

NOW create the Grotto Final Play / Test

Now let's test our programs one final time *does a message get played or appear when the frog reaches the grotto? *does everything else work like you expected it to?

Great Job! You have just completed a full computer game! Feel free to go back through and make any improvement to your game or experiment with any ideas/agents/behaviors you may have. You can even add another level. Awesome work!

SAVE

If time: take post-survey. Otherwise, simply review what we did and instruct the students that the following week we will begin a month long to semester section on scalable game designs.

June 9, 2009
Since my classes are required and are offered weekly. I will be introducing the Scalable Design course over a 3 week time span. Each class will be 45 minutes long and held twice a week. I plan on October being dedicated to this project for all of my middle school students - 6 through 8 During the first semester I'll be coordinating the computational thinking and game designing with the science department...I hope!

School link is minimal especially during the summer! trinitypueblo.org

Statewide Competition on game designing would be amazing!!