Your constructive feedback is valued – thank-you in advance for your time with this.
Important
Most of you will be dismissed at 11:30 AM. Please wait until I come out to dismiss you. Until then, to minimize traffic and noise in the academic block, please stay in Hadden Hall, with the exception of essential trips to the washroom.
In your portfolio, make one additional post and add links to final versions of your work to share with our LDPS partners so they can play them in the future.
Today we make our final visit to Lakefield District Public School to share your finished products with the students there.
Important
Please be sure that all the evidence you wish to have considered for your culminating task is in your portfolio by 10 PM on Sunday. This is to ensure your attention is not divided as you prepare for final evaluations in other courses.
Things to do before our next class
How did it feel to deliver your app to your partners?
What did you learn from the experience?
How was this culminating task different for you from other assignments you've had to complete for school?
This is your fourth and final working period to implement the plans you have made with your partner(s) at Lakefield DPS.
Continue making progress on implementing functionality in your app prior to our final visit to LDPS tomorrow afternoon at 2:00 PM, when the final version of your app will be delivered to your partners.
Be sure to consult All Prior Classes to access prior resources shared to help you build out your apps.
Note
Mr. Gordon will be running a Grove Time from 12:30 to 2:00 PM on Thursday (tomorrow) in room 36 to handle any (small) last minute questions.
Things to do before our next class
Be certain to briefly share an update on Notion, including screenshot(s) and a link to the current state of your project (if using Thunkable) or the .a3p file (if using Alice).
On Notion, share screenshot(s) and a link to the current state of your project (if using Thunkable) or the .a3p file (if using Alice).
Please also share photos of the notes you took today and add any additional thoughts you have about what to do next based on your conversation at LDPS.
You can clone this gravity experiments project to follow along and then try the super-short mini-challenges that are described.
Things to do before our next class
Be certain to briefly share an update on Notion, including screenshot(s) and a link to the current state of your project (if using Thunkable) or the .a3p file (if using Alice).
Sometimes many tiny image assets come embedded in a single large image file. This video explains how to easily "slice up" a sprite sheet into many smaller individual image files in seconds.
Also learn how to quickly crop unwanted pixels to create a transparent background using Preview.
Here are a couple of examples of using the Canvas component with stages and sprites.
Mr. Gordon is available to explain more about how these projects work to anyone who is interested:
This site has an "automatic mode" for slicing up sprite sheets where each frame has a slightly different size.
Tip
This is not a must-do, but many websites sharing image assets are heavily littered with intrusive ads (and probably data trackers, too).
Consider installing an alternative browser that blocks ads and trackers by default; Vivaldi is one option Mr. Gordon has been using lately. It uses the same rendering engine as Chrome (so it will work with all the same sites) but it is much nicer to browse the web without intrusive ads.
Things to do before our next class
Be certain to briefly share an update on Notion, including screenshot(s) and a link to the current state of your project (if using Thunkable) or the .a3p file (if using Alice).
If your app does involve telling time, please speak with Mr. Gordon, who can give you a few tips about how to handle quizzing with time relatively easily.
Things to do before our next class
Be certain to briefly share an update on Notion, including screenshot(s) and a link to the current state of your project (if using Thunkable) or the .a3p file (if using Alice).
This is your first working period to begin implementing the plans you have made with your partner(s) at Lakefield DPS.
You are welcome to use Alice, Thunkable, Scratch, Snap!, or whatever programming environment you are comfortable with and that best fits the task at hand.
For any students using Thunkable, Mr. Gordon will demonstrate how to load many images at once into a project.
Here is a video Mr. Gordon recorded to explain how to program core game play for most types of apps that students are working on:
Please keep track of the source(s) from where you obtain image and audio assets for your game. These should be cited within your game – for example – on a "Credits" screen.
Things to do before our next class
Be certain to briefly share an update on Notion, including screenshot(s) and a link to the current state of your project (if using Thunkable) or the .a3p file (if using Alice).
How can we collect fast feedback on our work with less up-front effort?
This is a working period to prepare your paper prototype for review by your partners at LDPS on Friday.
Tip
If you were at Camp Medeba today, please watch this short follow-up video (less than 3 minutes long) to better understand what you need to do before Monday at 8:30 AM. Thanks to Blake Dobson for making a guest appearance in this video!
Important
Drop by room 36 before period 1 on Friday to get the materials you need to make your paper prototype.
This will help each of you, as the consultants, determine what type of fun, educational app you might design for the students at LDPS, who are your clients.
Things to do before our next class
Add anything else to your post that helps you remember what the students you spoke with are interested in.
At the start of class, please make a brief post on Notion, and hand in your work-in-progress, regardless of where you are.
This means uploading the .a3p file for your task.
Continue making progress on your task during the period.
At the end of class, please hand in the .a3p file for your work-in-progress again in a new Notion post, with a brief video this time showing what happens in your world.
Note
You may continue to work on your end-of-mod task until 11 PM on Saturday, March 2, 2024.
If you wish, after Study this evening, you may update your laptop to macOS Sonoma, as we will not be using the Playgrounds coding environment again this year.
Be sure to finish at least one round of this activity.
If you completed an image yesterday, see Mr. Gordon to select another image to practice abstraction with – that is, the process of looking for where loops and functions can be applied.
Today, once you finish the initial task (be sure to carefully review the success criteria), look for ways to extend your name plate.
Add shapes, color, or drawings that are personally meaningful to you – another way to show your understanding is to try doing bubble letters.
Example
Mr. Gordon loves baseball, so he might use a green rectangle to represent grass, a blue rectangle to represent the sky, and a baseball flying through the air, with his name in the foreground in bubble letters.
Here is one example of bubble letters that Mr. Gordon made last year:
HINT: To draw curves, experiment with the addArc command.
