Course Outline

• Project 1 – Scratch Animation

• Students explore the Scratch user interface and learn how to add sprites and backdrops. They use ‘event-based programming and ‘sequences’ to develop an animation that tells a story.

• Lesson 1 – The Scratch User Interface: 

• Level 1: Students explore the different parts of the Scratch user interface. They learn how to add sprites and backdrops and start learning how to move sprites. 

• Level 2: Students understand how sprites are positioned in Scratch using coordinates. 

• Lesson 2 – Scratch Animation - Layout and Design: 

• Level 1: Students complete the layout and design aspects of their animation and discuss the programming logic needed for the animation. 

• Level 2: Students understand the concept of abstraction by creating a procedure and a block of their own.

• Lesson 3 – Scratch Animation – Algorithms and logic: 

• Level 1: Students complete developing and debugging the program.

• Level 2: Students use sequencing and control structures to add sounds to the animation.

• Challenge: Students solve a debugging challenge involving an animation. 

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• Project 2: The Image Editor

• Students develop an image and photo editing app that alters an image or a photo when various buttons are clicked. 

• Lesson 1: The Image Editor – Design 1: 

• Level 1: Students go through the final application and decompose the output into constituent elements. 

• Level 2: Students understand how to add extensions and add the ‘Video Sensing’ extension to their project.

• Lesson 2: The Image Editor – Design 2: 

• Level 1: Students add the required Sprites and backdrops for their project. 

• Level 2: Students add the required Sprites and backdrops for their project. 

• Lesson 3: The Image Editor - Algorithms: 

• Level 1: Students complete developing the image editor app by writing the required script. In this process, they understand event-based programming and the concept of ‘broadcast and receive’ in Scratch.

• Level 2: Students complete developing the photo editor app by writing the required script. In addition to editing images, this app also takes a photograph of the user that they can then edit. 

• Challenge: Students solve a debugging challenge involving the image editor.
   

• Project 3 – The Asteroid Game

• Students develop a ‘Point and Click’ based game in which the user plays a space explorer who needs to fire upon and destroy randomly appearing asteroids in space. 

• Lesson 1 – The Asteroid Game - Design: 

• Level 1: Students go through the final output and decompose it into constituent elements. They add the required Sprites and the backdrops for the game. 

• Level 2: Students add a start screen and an end screen to their games and understand how to use ‘broadcast and receive’ blocks to add these screens to a project. 

• Lesson 2 – The Asteroid Game - Mechanics: 

• Level 1: Students add code for the basic gameplay with sequences, event-based blocks, and iterations. They understand how to use the ‘random’ function to position sprites at random locations on the stage. 

• Level 2: Students customize the random function to position sprites in constrained areas on the stage.  

• Lesson 3 – The Asteroid Game - Gamification 

• Level 1: Students refine their game by adding gamification elements such as a scoring system. In this process, they understand how to use variables to store data, update variables, and retrieve variable data during a program.

• Level 2: Students use additional variables to add a timer to their code. In this process, they understand how to use control structures such as the ‘wait’ command to control the timing of different events in their scripts.

• Challenges: Students attempt a debugging challenge involving the point and click game.

• Project 4 – The Amazing Maze

• Students develop a maze navigation game in which a Sprite has to navigate a Maze to reach an objective while avoiding the maze walls. They explore how to use ‘key’ presses as events to trigger Sprite movements and understand how collision mechanics work in Scratch.

• Lesson 1 – The Amazing Maze - Design: 

• Level 1: Students go through the final output and decompose the program into its constituent elements. They add the necessary Sprites and backgrounds for the project. They understand how to use the ‘point’ and ‘move’ blocks to control Sprite movement.

• Level 2: Students understand how to develop multi-level games in Scratch using the ‘broadcast and receive’ blocks. They learn how to use positional coordinates to control Sprite movement.

• Lesson 2 – The Amazing Maze – Mechanics & Gamification 1: 

• Level 1: Students add the required programming logic for the maze game. They understand how to detect collisions between sprites and between sprites and backgrounds. In this process, they learn the concept of conditional statements (if-then) in programming. They also explore how to create new procedures in Scratch to improve the efficiency and reusability of their code.

• Level 2: Students explore the difference between the if-then and the if-then-else blocks and understand the concept of alternating execution of conditionals.

• Lesson 3 – The Amazing Maze – Mechanics & Gamification 2

• Level 1: Students finish developing the maze game and debug it.

• Level 2: Students add a new level to their maze game with increased complexity. 

• Challenges: Students solve a debugging challenge involving the maze game.

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• Project 5 (Design Challenge) – The Submarine Game

• Students are challenged to use all the concepts they have learned in previous projects to create a submarine game. The game involves using the mouse to control a submarine as it navigates through various obstacles and tries to reach an objective. Students use sequences, loops, variables, conditional statements and random functions to develop this game.

• Lesson 1 – The Submarine Game - Design: 

• Level 1: Students go through the final output and decompose the program into its constituent elements. They add the necessary Sprites and backgrounds for the project. They figure out how to use the mouse to control a sprite’s movement. 

• Level 2: Students ideate on the design aspects and programming logic involved in adding additional obstacles.

• Lesson 2 – The Submarine Game – Mechanics & Gamification: 

• Level 1: Students add the required programming logic for the submarine game. They add scripts to detect collisions between sprites and between sprites and backgrounds. 

• Level 2: Students add the required programming logic for the submarine game. They add scripts to detect collisions between sprites and between sprites and backgrounds

• Lesson 3 – The Submarine Game - Gamification 

• Level 1: Students complete coding for the submarine game. They add a start screen, a win screen, and a loss screen and use the ‘broadcast and receive’ block to add these screens to the game.

• Level 2: Students use ‘variables’ and the ‘random’ function to code for additional obstacles that rotate at random speeds and in different directions.

• Challenges: Students solve a debugging challenge.