Maze programs should be completed, shared and in the students' Scratch studios by the end of the class.

Those who finish early may start thinking about our next, much bigger, game project, which will take many weeks to complete. Students will be designing their own computer games. Although there are many types of computer games, the type of game students will be creating is one in which a sprite is to touch something (or things), or to avoid something (or things), or a combination of both.

To plan the game, the following questions need to be answered.

1. Where does the game take place?
2. Who is the main player character? What will the sprite look like?
3. What is the story in the game? What problem is being solved, or what goal is met by the player?
4. What does the player sprite want to touch? Another sprite? Or colour? Or object? What happens when the player touches it?
5. What does the player sprite want to avoid touching? What happens when it touches it?
6. How does the player win? What happens when the player wins?

Before any coding starts, the planning needs to be complete!

This week, we will be solidifying our understanding of the use of loops in computer programs. Students will write a Hopscotch script to draw a set of 100 stairs, using a loop to save lots of typing! Then, with the remaining time, students will work on the Loopy Lessons in K

This week in class students will continue to work on their Maze Projects.

At the beginning of class, we will discuss various algorithms for getting the Sprite through the maze.

Here is a project that contains some hints, but will not work as it stands.

Maze Hints

Maze Projects are due February 24.

This week in class we will complete our experiment of comparing rolling a 12-sided die with rolling two 6-sided dice. Is getting a 7 more likely with the 12-sided die, or the two dice?

If we finish early, students will have the opportunity to work on the Loopy Lessons in Kodable Pro.

Here are Scratch simulations of die rolling:

Rolling 12 sided die

Rolling Two 6-sided dice

This past Monday, students started a Maze Project in Scratch. To ensure that students have enough time in work out the details of the more complicated code that is necessary to make the maze work, I have extended the project due date to February 24. (Note that there is no school on Monday Feb 17).

Next Monday February 10 in class, we will compare and contrast different approaches for making the sprite move through the maze. Students will then have to the end of the following class, on February 24, to complete the project.

Working on the project at home, although always encouraged, is only required if students feel they will need more time than is available in class.

This week we will be starting a maze project. Students will create a Scratch program that is a simple maze, with a small sprite that can navigate the maze using the arrow keys. Usually I post an example program, but to allow students the chance to figure out the details of how to program the maze themselves, there isn't one this week.

Projects are due at the end of class next week, Monday February 10, 2014. As well as sharing the projects on-line and putting them in their AcadecapXXForMmeSarah Studio, students are required to complete the worksheet handed out in class (which contains marking scheme details).

Today we will be experimenting to see how likely it is to get each of the numbers when we roll one die. Then, we will see a demonstration of how a Scratch program can simulate the rolling of a die many times. If time permits, we will then experiment to see how likely it is to get the numbers 2 to 12 when rolling two dice and adding the values. Again, we will look at a Scratch program that simulates the rolling of two dice.

One Die Rolling

Two Dice Rolling