Charlie Mitchell

School

 * Metropolitan Stage College of Denver

How will I introduce Scalable Game Design in my school?
words

Project Journal
Summer Institute, June 1-11, 2010

Reflection 1, June 1, 2010

For the first day using AgentSheets, the class was instructed to create Frogger. Although seemingly easy to create from first glance, it was actually quite a task. There are many components that must be programmed for the game to work correctly that didn't occur to me. For example, the frog can easily reach the goal by simply going along the sides, over all of the tunnels without danger. Once a teacher came over and identified the problem, I was able to change the program and fix it.

After learning the basic creation skills, we then were given situations and told to find a way to program it ourselves. This was a key aspect in the creation process, as we had to use the skills we had learned and expand on them with critical thinking.

By the end of the day, I had created my very own Frogger game that I was satisfied with, and had a great introduction to using AgentSheets.

Reflection 2, June 2, 2010

Space Invaders was the main goal today. This game introduced the idea of agents sending messages to other agents, called methods. Although very confusing at first, the use of methods became easier the more I used it. Even so, this game was far more difficult for me to create than Frogger. Getting the ships to move in a particular pattern, and figuring out how to end the game took a long time to understand. I felt the teaching process was a little rushed, and the tutorial on the wiki was confusing, leaving me lost in the design. But with the help of the student teachers, I was finally able to grasp the concept and finish the game, though some parts of the design process were lost on me.

Reflection 3, June 3, 2010

Today we learned about "Collaborative Diffusion," the concept of an agent emitting a particular scent that other agents will follow. This became a key programming element when creating The Sims. Thankfully, the presentation about Collaborative Diffusion was well done and easy to follow.

We then learned how to make an agent feel that whatever is emitting the scent needs to be found, and when the need to find it is satisfied, that need begins to grow again as time goes on. It sounds confusing even as typing it, but the entire programming concept came easily thanks to the great instruction.

We then were told to make our very own Sims game. The hardest part was coming up with an idea, but after that it was all just the programming we had just learned. During the creation process, I found out the hard way that the entire game could have drastic problems due to one simple typo in the programming. Once this was resolved, the writing continued, eventually coming to an end. Seeing the characters I'd created moving around fulfilling the basics of Maslow's Heirarchy of Needs (food, sleep, etc.) was the most satisfying exciting thing I'd done since starting the program.

Reflection 4, June 4, 2010

Finally, the chance to use all the skills we've learned this week to make our very own game! After brainstorming a couple ideas, I decided to try for a game similar to Space Invaders so I could get a better understanding of the programming. The result was an iteration of Ikaruga, one of my favorite space shooters of all time. This game used ideas we hadn't even tackled in class, and yet I was able to figure out how to get the agents to do exactly what I wanted. With the help of a tutorial on the wiki and the teachers, I was also able to create a score keeper for the first time.

Time ran out before I was able to finish how to beat the game, but the idea is still fresh in my mind. I never thought I'd be able to make the kind of game I wanted after only a few days of classes, but thanks to the simplicity of the program and the help of the teachers, the satisfaction of creating my own game and showing to others quickly became a reality.

Reflection 5, June 5, 2010

Today class was optional, but I decided to go in anyways to get help finishing my game. During the writing process for making the boss appear, many problems came up, and had to be fixed. After fixing most of them, I made the simple yet detrimental mistake of saving my project in the middle of the game. Luckily I was able to download the copy I'd uploaded to the arcade, but everything I'd worked on today was lost. Most of the work was coming up with how to write the behaviors of the agents, which is still in my head, so it won't be too bad getting back to it.

Reflection 6, June 8, 2010

Pacman was the main goal today. Using the collaborative diffusion technique from the Sims game became the key part of the game. Having this project come after the Sims project made making Pacman much easier. The only new concepts I learned were advanced skills from the teachers who walked around helping people.

Pacman is one of the most notable and memorable games of all time, and I think middle school students would jump at the opportunity to create it. The teaching method used today to describe collaborative diffusion used a group participation demonstration that made everything much easier to understand. If implemented into schools, I would suggest placing this game second or third, before the Sims. It's a game everyone knows and loves, and surprisingly fun and simple to create! Unfortunately, I haven't learned how to create the power pellet attributes yet, but tomorrow we have time to finish up.

Reflection 7, June 8, 2010

When learning a program that we're going to teach to kids, being able to sit in on such a class is extremely useful. Today, we all had that opportunity. Heading over to the high school, we were able to watch Fred teach a special two week class. The only difference between the class he was teaching and the classes we will all be teaching this fall was that the kids specifically signed up for this class because of their interests, while the fall classes will have a mandatory attendance. This ment that the kids we saw today already had a knack for computers and programming, thus picking up AgentSheets incredibly quick. Which really added to the saying that while you're young, your brain acts like a sponge, absorbing knowledge far easier than an adult.

Seeing the teaching in action helped me decide the pace and terminology that should be used for teaching kids.

Once we returned to the usual classroom, we learned about the kind of programming necessary for creating an Ant Simulation. The goal of this simulation was the show how ants find food and return it to the nest. This was completely different, because all we've done up until now is create games. Being able to create scientific simulations opens up an entirely new window of opportunity for this program.

Within this simulation, we also had to troubleshoot a version of the simulation that had a key element removed. Using other debugging techniques we learned this morning, as well as our experiences from the past week, we were quickly able to identify the problem and fix it.

Not only did we learn about creating scientific simulations using AgentSheets, we also learned how to troubleshoot problems, which is extremely important knowledge for when we teach this program to others.

First Unit

Day/Week 1 Reflection, DATE

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Day/Week 2 Reflection, DATE

Here is where you can put information about your second unit.

Day/Week 3 Reflection, DATE

etc.

End Of Unit Reflection &amp; Possible Changes, DATE 

Reflection

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Other Comments, DATE 

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Lesson Plans
This is an example from Sandy Rea's page that linked lesson plans in documents.

Here's a website with my Frogger Tutorial, which also references and links to the Frogger Tutorial on the Scalable Game Design Wiki: http://schools.bvsd.org/aspencreek2/computer/Frogger/index.html


 * [[Media:Frogger_intro.ppt|SlideShow Intro into AgentSheets &amp; Frogger ]]
 * [[Media:Frogger_Lesson_Plan_Outline_sandy_rea.doc|Lesson Plan Outline for Frogger (in progress)]]
 * [[Media:Frogger_Lesson_Plan_Day_1_sandy_rea.doc|Lesson Plans for Frogger Day 1 (in progress)]]
 * [[Media:Frogger_Lesson_Plan_Day_2_sandy_rea.doc|Lesson Plans for Frogger Day 2 (in progress)]]
 * [[Media:Frogger_Lesson_Plan_Day_3_sandy_rea.doc|Lesson Plans for Frogger Day 3 (in progress)]]
 * [[Media:Frogger_Lesson_Plan_Day_4_sandy_rea.doc|Lesson Plans for Frogger Day 4 (in progress)]]
 * [[Media:Frogger_Lesson_Plan_Day_5_sandy_rea.doc|Lesson Plans for Frogger Day 5 (in progress)]]
 * [[Media:UploadingGameToArcade.doc|Step-by-step guide for preparing and uploading game to Arcade]]

Contact Information

 * [mailto:charliemitchell0@aol.com Email]