Learning Primary Programming with Scratch (Home Learning Book Years 5-6)

Phil Bagge

Description

Scratch teaching and learning made easy thanks to up-to-date, classroom-tested methodologies. Draws on the expertise of Code-IT and HIAS.

Sujets

• Langages
• Computers
• EDUCATION
• Informatique
• General officer
• Programming language
• General

Informations

• Publié par: Legend Press
• Date de parution: 17 octobre 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 3
• EAN13: 9781915054197
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

Learning Primary Programming with Scratch
Home Learning Book Years 5-6
Phil Bagge
Copyright Phil Bagge 2022
All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission.
Except for the quotation of short passages for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism and review, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, copied or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, now known or hereafter invented, save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Design and Patents Act 1988, or under terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the publisher.
This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
ISBN 978-1-91505-4-180
Contents
INTRODUCTION
About these book
Prior Knowledge needed
Resources Needed
Ages
Symbols
Helping children who are stuck
CHAPTER ONE
Revisiting the learning from Book
CHAPTER TWO
Introducing Condition-Starts-Action
Making Choices
CHAPTER THREE
Introducing condition-ends-loop
Playing Catch
CHAPTER FOUR
Introducing condition-switches-between-actions
Pico Terra
CHAPTER FIVE
Introducing Conditions inside loops
Balloon Pop
CHAPTER SIX
Revising Count-controlled-loops using shape
Introducing basic procedures
Shape Procedures
CHAPTER SEVEN
Introducing Variables
Karaoke
CHAPTER EIGHT
Introducing Variables that Change
Oil Slick
HOME EDUCATORS ANSWERS AND HINTS
About these books
If you picked these books up off the shelf and are leafing through them you deserve to know what they are and how they work before you buy them.
The first half of this book is the young programmer s workbook and the second half of this book is the home educators guide.
This book is not a textbook you just give to a child and let them get on with it on their own. There are plenty of these copy code type books out there, this is not one of them. This book needs an active child home educator partnership.
Prior Knowledge Needed
You will both need the understanding of programming gained through the earlier book aimed at 7-9 year olds.
Resources Needed
To use these books you will need either a laptop, PC, Mac or Chromebook. If the budget is tight I recommend a Chromebook and a free Google account to make it work.
The easiest way to use these resources is with internet access and a free Scratch account. In many chapters I will be sharing pre-made programs for you both to examine and learn from. If you wish to avoid internet access there is a link to download all the programs and the chapter 1 video and you can install offline Scratch.
Research
This book uses the latest research driven code comprehension methods. Your child needs to predict what code does, answer questions about it and modify existing code before creating new things. The home educator will be alerted to possible pitfalls and checks via the home educator section at the back of the book. I recommend you read that chapter and the answers before working with your child.
Away from the computer
Do not be surprised if we work offline to introduce new ideas through roleplay and offline exercises. These sections are really important. Do not let your child race through them. Check their understanding as they go. There is a special home educator symbol which denotes things to do together and in the home educator book there are hints to help your child if they get stuck. At the end of this chapter, there is an explanation of all the symbols used in the book and advice on how to help your child whilst encouraging independence and resilience.
Timing
A word on timing. Every child is different and so this book is not split into lessons. I recommend about an hour a week but you know your child best. Sometimes children will get excited about creating a project at those times a little more time to explore and create is useful. Most chapters follow a pattern of introducing a concept offline followed by code comprehension and then time to create online. When you see a new concept being introduced these are good longer break points.
Ages
These books are designed for children between the ages of 7-12. Older children will often have a greater advantage as they have greater reading and maths skills. Book one is designed for 7-9 year olds and this volume, Book 2 for 10-12 year olds, however, do not jump straight to this book set if your child is older. They need to cover the information in book 1 before moving on.
Concepts covered (do not worry if this means nothing as that is part of our journey)
Loops that are ended by conditions
Conditional selection
Conditions that start actions
Conditions that switch between actions
Conditions that are continually checked within indefinite loops
Nested loops
Variables that are used as placeholders
Variables that increase or decrease
Simple procedures
Adaptable procedures

Symbols

Important Vocabulary

Information

Something to write or draw

Working with your home educator
90 degrees
Answers are in red in the home educator back part of the book

Helping Children who are stuck
The process is more important than the outcome. If your child is on task and puzzling something out give them time to do so. It is better to have 60% finished where that work is mainly the children s own work than 100% finished where a home educator solved it for them.
It is very important to establish a positive attitude towards problem solving. Computing science is very useful in that it calls errors bugs and finding errors debugging. Although all bugs are caused by humans, the language is much more impersonal than mistakes which imply blame or fault. Using bug and debugging language is helpful. It is also important to let children know that mistakes/bugs are a normal part of computing, that they are to be expected, that professional programmers write code that have bugs all the time and that the home educator will not be cross or upset if their work has bugs/mistakes.
Promote the idea that it is not the home educators job to fix their algorithms or debug their code. It is the home educators job to promote useful strategies that they can use to fix things themselves (see hints at the back of the book). So when they come to you, they know they are looking for strategies to find and fix things themselves.
For those children transitioning from learnt helplessness to useful problem solving they need to see what they are doing. Ask your child; are you trying to get me to do your work for you Are you trying to get me to solve the problem for you? Some children won t be able to move on until they recognise their work avoidance strategy for what it is. Good home educators do this tactfully and with regards to children s known issues, but an element of gentle challenge is inevitable to identify the issue.
You can describe what to do but please don t provide a full solution to programming problems (the hints in the back of the book will help).
Try and avoid touching your child s mouse, keyboard or touchscreen. You can compare this to writing the answers in their maths exercise book.
Move children away from language that personifies digital machines. My computer hates me, is typical. Computers are deterministic machines which means that if all the inputs are the same you will always get the same output. Personification encourages children to think that an answer might not be available due to the capriciousness of the machine, an attitude that is anti-problem solving and incorrect.
As parents and home educators, we know that children don t do what we say but what we do. This is just as true in computing. Try and model a positive outlook to technology as this will be reflected back in your child s attitude to programming and their wider use of IT.
Revisiting the Learning from Book One
In book one we learnt about sequence and loops.
We roleplayed and wrote every day algorithms that had count controlled loops in them.
Can you role play this algorithm?
Stand
Loop 3 times
Say I rock
Wave right hand
Wave left hand
Sit
We also drew the flow of control like this adding dots to show actions.


We learnt how count controlled loops could have many actions before, inside and after the loop.
Can you name the action before the loop above?
_____________

We then explored count controlled loops in code

List the code actions that get repeated three times in the code on the left
____________
____________

We also learnt about indefinite loops. Loops where we could not tell when they would end or how many times they would loop.
The easiest of these in Scratch code is the forever loop

Draw the flow of control on this code
We learnt that once the flow of control entered a forever loop it would continue until the program was forced to stop.
Can more code be placed after the forever loop?
_____________

Book Two
This book will teach you about lots of new and exciting programming concepts which you will use creatively to make all sorts of projects. However, don t forget that you can always use the ideas you have learnt from book one as well to improve your creations.

Now mark your revision answers with your home educator
Condition-starts-action
Conditions that start actions are very common in our everyday life.
Have you every heard or said something similar to these.

CONDITIONAL
A condit