Broadcast Feature in Scratch

I felt that I needed to interact and "look inside" a few other Scratch projects to better understand the different ways to use the broadcast feature. I found that by clicking on the stories button on the broadcast tutorial page took me to other user projects that had used the broadcast controllers. I found it very helpful to explore the sprite and stage commands to do my remix. Thanks to Jaw156 and their project to help me better grasp the broadcast tools.

Makey Makey Controller with Scratch

I really became engrossed in the platform game remix. Growing up with Donkey Kong as being one of my favorite classic Atari arcade games, I instantly wanted to do my best to transform my remix into a challenging game, with sound effects, added sprite obstacles, if-then commands, etc. I was fairly pleased by the fact that I had a difficult time reaching the bowl of cheese puff snacks.

I've embedded the game below and here is the link to "see inside".

As for adding the Makey Makey controller, I wanted to see how easily I could create an impromptu controller out of whatever metal objects I had in my office. That is one of the more impressive characteristics of the Makey Makey board... it is so amazingly easy to set up a simple circuit. So within 5 minutes or less, I had added the butter knife as the right arrow controller and the Allen wrench as the up arrow. My ring served as a convenient object for clipping the alligator grounding clip onto.

Dog-Panda Grid-Maze of Horror

Not a fun experience! My right-brain personality absolutely freaked out while attempting to finish the dog (or is it a panda?) grid-coding challenge of putting on my computational thinking cap and hashing it out, literally, step-by-step, graph line-by-graph line. I couldn't suppress the urge to make my coding guide slightly graphically pleasing, yet I had a creeping dread that I was totally missing the point of spotting the obvious solution to efficiently writing out the code. I wanted to make sure I only worked digitally, without printing out the grid picture... so much for an unplugged approach. At first, I  felt confident that I could keep track of my coding track, but at every block of the journey, my mind wandered and lost track of which row or column I was currently on. "Should I arrange my coding "steps" as individual commands or create shorthand style cluster-commands?" After having to divert my glance over to the text-box where I was writing the code,  I sheepishly redirected my gaze back over to the gridline maze, and my eyes miserably failed to relocate the last block I'd finished coding.

I finally succumbed to the obvious need to print out the confounding DOG-GRID picture so I could have the comforting tactile experience to running a pencil along my coding path to mark my progression. It helped so much, and I was able to wrap it up in about a half hour. I find it odd that I feel much more comfortable with block-coding and text-based coding. This (what I erroneously assumed was a simplistic) challenge discombobulated me. I hope I don't see this dog-face-grid-maze in my nightmares tonight.

CS First & Scratch.MIT.edu

I have to admit that I had a rough start with getting into the workflow of logging into CS First and then scratch.mit.edu. I found it to be very awkward to jump back and forth between the two sites using my browser's tabs. I also wasn't totally clear on when I technically had completed an activity. At first, I assumed that I would be done with an activity by finishing my scratch remix and then sharing it... then I would continue with the next CS First activity. Possibly I didn't take the time to carefully listen to the instructions in the CS videos.

I eventually figured out that once I'd completed my scratch remix, I needed to return to CS First to answer the wrap up quiz questions before I could advance to the next activity. So... I was very happy to feel my frustration turn to exhilaration when I began absorbing the racetrack activity's interfacing with key commands on my computer's keyboard. I quickly began exploring the various controller options to manipulate the sprites within the racetrack scene. I had even more fun and gratification with designing a very simplistic game in the 3rd activity, recording sound effects and using the sensing color code blocks. I feel that when I made the obstacle object rotate with the "forever" bracket, I had an ah-ha moment where I realized how many times I've seen this sort of basic programming trick used in so many video games... creating a non-static maze... or moving target... etc. to add a level of difficulty to a game. I hope to make it through at least another 3 activities in the next few weeks. Overall a very effective intro to computational thinking. The element of tying keyboard and mouse controls into the design process really helped keep me totally engaged.

Investigating Coding Applications for Linux OS

I came across Greenfoot for Java Programming as bundled software with the Raspbian OS on the Raspberry Pi B+ I have in my office.

The instant results I could create by tinkering with the code for some of the default scenarios was very gratifying and informative... cause and effect right before my eyes. I have to admit, coding on a Raspeberry Pi takes a lot of patience due to how slowly windows load.

I then attempted to install Java SDK and Netbeans on my Linux laptop to start doing Java tutorials in Greenfoot. I am realizing that some installation processes are a bit more complicated on Linux, especially since there are so many distros of Linux currently available for download (I have Linux Mint installed on my Macbook Air). When I ran the Greenfoot install file I got the following error message: "Dependency is not satisfiable: openjdk-8-jdk". So I need to install Java JDK before I can run Greenfoot. I'm eager to get past this initial roadblock.