This week we learned primarily about coding resources for kids.The resources that michael made available to us were for learners of various ages. Some were better and more user friendly while others were difficult to navigate or just not enticing enough. I was placed in a group that looked at Scratch Jr. Unfortunately an Ipad was required to use this platform and I did not have access to one so I was unable to explore the app. However, other members in my group did and shared with the rest of the group the things you could do with Scratch Jr. From what I saw it looked l;ike an app that introduced the very basic foundations of coding to children; to make it more visually appealing the characters, backgrounds and overall theme of the app was very colourful. There were so many different things you could do that it was almost slightly overwhelming. You could pick and choose your own character, make them whatever colour you liked as well as make them do a variety of different movements, produce sounds as well as type into a speech bubble to make them ‘speak’.
I think the app that my group explored was very well made. It did not really have much actual coding involved as it was meant for young children about age 4-6. However the fact that you could pick buttons and insert them into a ‘code’ to make the characters on the screen walk, jump etc is connected to the idea that coding is creating something from using a variety of different codes. I would definitely introduce this to my class one day if my class had access to Ipads. I could not think of any downfalls for this app as my experience with it is extremely limited and I did not personally use it.
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