Getting Unstuck Redux Day 10

Last day of my Getting Unstuck 2020 revisit! There were tons of amazing projects in the studio again and after my personal explorations I am going back to start building student projects with some of the 230+ saved creations!

I had seen soooo many amazing projects using the Translate extension, I knew that I wanted to make a project with these blocks. The idea behind this was a blend of two things: the children's game "Telephone" - where a message is passed down the line, person to person, and secondly, the amazing international Scratch community! Every day groups of people from all over the world came together to work on this experience. Scratchers from the across North America, Netherlands, Italy, Russia, and Australia offered me advice and solved my coding quandaries every day. I wanted to celebrate both of these in my original Day 10 project:



So for this last day, there were several ideas I wanted to explore, but I settled on a "typewriting" effect used by @karenb in her Day 10 (and by several other Scratchers over the course of GU 2020) and I went back to a project by @yhsieh in the Day 5 studio where she made Van Gogh's Starry Night come alive with a perfect musical accompaniment and some erasure and substitutions.
I love Art Nouveau and decided to take the Czech artist Mucha and pair his work with a contemporaneous compatriot - Dvorak. The Metropolitan Opera has been streaming their productions nightly since mid March (which has been a lifeline in my new shut-in existence) and tonight's is Rusalka! It was meant to be! It's not as effective as @yhsieh's https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/410867880/ but I hope you enjoy it!

Getting Unstuck Redux Day 9

Penultimate day of my secong run through of Getting Unstuck 2020!

I whipped together a project using a list and thought I was done, then I realized it was almost identical to one of my previous projects and was NOT doing anything "interesting" with the list! Last minute hysterical scramble to put together this Clue game. I did enjoy making it and I hope you will play it:

or if you can't play in the blog here is the link on Scratch: https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/411691853

I wasn't sure what I wanted to work on today - I saved tons of projects from the studio, but almost all were planned reworks for student assignments. My absolute favorite project was a digital version of a code breaking game by Scratcher @pkirschmann: https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/411998185/  - you should absolutely try it! Also, @mstone326 coded a digital version of the card game WAR that is so much fun!  https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/412020525/ @Mme_Roome made a Scratch Boggle game too: https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/411908450/

While all the games were amazing, I am still hung up on producing visual effects! Picking up from Scratcher @giulioooo's project from Day 6 and the inspiration of the traditional stage presentation of the lovely Coro a bocca chiusa, in Puccini's Madama Butterfly. I hope you enjoy it!

Getting Unstuck Redux Day 8

It is Day 8 and the prompt called for using a variable.

I didn't save as many projects today (only 22!), but I LOVED every single one! I created a game for Monarch Heroes with 3 levels. I have such a hard time with games! I cannot play them so I never know if they are too hard or too easy! All the bugs in the project were pictures I took in our gardens.

So I wanted to work on creating a firework effect today and started off inspired by a really fantastic project: https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/411894563/ but I ended up being more focused on lighting effects and went back to a couple of projects I had saved from the Day 6 studio by Scratchers @mrreuland and @giulioooo. I love fireflies and this reminded me of a special place I visited many years ago. I hope you like it!

NEW PROJECT

Getting Unstuck Redux Day 7

The prompt for Day 7 was using the ask and answer blocks. I use these a great deal, so wanted to focus on building proficiency with another aspect of the pen extension.  

My original project was a Magic 8 Ball "randomizer" based on a popular assignment from our STEAM Lab.

As I was revisiting the really marvelous range of projects in the studio I found the perfect thing! https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/411520923 by Scratcher @CyberParra translated words into art and it made me think of one of my favorite artists - the brilliant Spanish Surrealist, Joan Miro. I was able to learn to use the stamp feature and play with the idea of "automatic painting". 

I had a lot of fun with this and hope you enjoy it!

Getting Unstuck Redux Day 6

This prompt brought out some spectacular creativity! I save more than 30 projects from this day's studio - great games, gorgeous effects, and charming animations.

For me the prompt recalled some of our No Place For Hate events. I took a list created by the 2nd and 3rd grade coalition members for an event in 2017-18 that I still have in my records and uploaded it as a list. The program then calls a random "act of kindness" from the list each time you click the space bar.



 I really struggled with what I would work on today and just ended up going with the day's theme by falling back on "pick random". Scratcher Mattioli2 makes really wonderful things! The lightening program was just amazing. I didn't get it entirely figured out. I will have to continue to work on getting the effect just right, but I feel like I have a made a good start. Let me know what you think!

Getting Unstuck Redux – Day 5

Today marks the half-way point of my review! It has been really good to revisit the studios and sort all the projects I saved. After I finish my personal learning “remix”, I am going back through all the student ideas to write up the assignments – that will probably take 3-4 weeks, as there have been so many great ideas!

Today’s prompt was also well-known territory for me. I made a little scene where the shark sprite reacts to each of the other ocean critters if they touch. The sensing blocks are a lot of fun and work particularly well for games. Here is what I made:

I saved too many projects from the Day 5 studio, but fortunately most of the 30! projects were ideas for students so I didn’t need to pick through all of them for my learning project! I loved one maze project by Scratcher @HSSLab (https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/410905325) that appeared to have a glowing flashlight illuminate the maze!
I wanted to work with that effect, so here is how it went:

Not great, but I can understand how to get the look I want; I will just need to keep practicing!

Getting Unstuck Redux – Day 4

I use and have students use the broadcast blocks a lot. They are very adaptable for all kinds of purposes and clearly inspired a lot of creativity - I saved an absolutely enormous number of projects from the Day 4 studio!

I am taking a few different classes this summer and one of them is about mapping and using maps. That worked very well with the use of the broadcast block (like in Google maps, if you click on a location pic it takes you to information about that place). The Houston heat and being stuck at home for so long had me nostalgic for other summers we spent in cooler climates! This is what I made:

This studio has set me up with student Scratch project prompts/ starter projects/ challenges for years to come! Among the wealth of fantastic ideas were projects using the music extension with broadcasts and I was motivated to work with some of these effects today. I will need to practice with the music tools a great deal more, but I think kids will have fun playing the fish!

Here is how it went:

Getting Unstuck Redux – Day 3

Day three's challenge:

The minute I saw the two things at one time, I immediately thought of those silly challenges: Can you walk and chew gum at the same time? Pat your head and rub your belly? Hope on one leg and recite the Gettysburg Address? I used the first two for my project base:

Today’s studio was full of more amazing! How do people come up with these ideas? There are now almost a million things on my "I Need to Learn to Do That" list, but I decided to work on making the pen create symmetrical drawings. Again, I included the recorded introduction.This is what I made:

What do you think?

Getting Unstuck Redux – Day 2

A note about community and the importance of the notes/ credits/ comments. The Scratch community is all about learning and sharing. When I shared yesterday's project, I put a comment in the notes that I wasn't happy with the effect and was looking for suggestions. Another Scratch user saw the request and referred me to a couple of other fantastic projects that used the effects I wanted.

Use the comments! Use the Notes and Credits! Never be afraid to ask for help! That's the lesson and here is the new and improved project:
https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/412836264/

Now, onto Day 2!

I was re-amazed by all the projects in the Day 1 studio when I went back and had the same reaction to the Day 2 studio! So many amazing ideas and all from one prompt:

I have you all makes lots of projects with key presses so they can work with the Makey Makeys. Panther students were also the inspiration for my theme! In our Teams class meetings I heard from so many people that they wished they could go somewhere, anywhere! Here is the project:

The projects I saved from Day 2 were 90% student project ideas - you will LOVE them! However, there were a few skill challenges for me! I decided to work on visual effects with clones some more, sliders to let the user manipulate the sprite and its effects, the space bar changes the costume. I am also including something that will be part of your class Scratch projects this coming year - a voice recording introduction before the project starts.
See how I did:

Getting Unstuck Redux Day 1

The adventure really begins! The email:

Here is my Day 1 project:

Because students didn’t get to finish the year at school and see how the Eco-Schools projects turned out, I really wanted to include our habitats in the project. I have been taking care of the gardens since the students left and every time I go there is something new – a “surprise” each time I engage, so it seemed like a good fit for the project description.

One thing I love about Scratch is that it allows for so much creativity and personal expression! In the studio there were well over a hundred projects and every one was different! 

Another thing that was special about this was the conversations that were taking place in the comments. Not just hearts and stars, but real feedback about what people liked, great ideas about things to add, and suggestions about how to fix problems.

I starred 23 projects from the studio to revisit and learn from. 10 were great lesson ideas that you will be seeing soon in your STEAM lab assignments!13 of them were interesting effects or different ways of coding that I wanted to try. I chose to work on the pen extension. Here is what I made today:

It isn't 100% what I wanted yet, but the great thing about Scratch is you can always go back to add and improve! I hope you will try something new today too!

Getting Unstuck Redux - Day 0

I recently participated in a really fantastic learning experience called Getting Unstuck hosted by the Scratch Ed Team. One of the problems in teacher learning (and student learning!) is that we don’t take time to think about and delve into what we saw, heard, and did. Without time to reflect and re-examine new ideas and tools, they are quickly lost.

I want to make sure that doesn’t happen, so I will be sharing my Getting Unstuck Redux with you here! I will revisit the experience day by day to look at what I made, have a closer look at projects I saved, and see if I can build on what I learned.

Day 0

The introduction:

When we signed up, we received a welcome and an invitation to create a getting to know you project and share it to the studio. Here is mine: