Got GAME? Fix my 2D Animation Game

Lesson Content

• Lesson Plan Template:

  CTE Lesson Plan

• CTE Course Info and Benchmark Notes

  
  

  Program Name (as applicable):

  Coding Fundamentals

  Course Title:

  Coding Fundamentals

  Course Number:

  9009200

  Career Cluster:

  Information Technology

  CIP Number:

  05110201209

  Course Type:

  EXPL- Middle School Programs

  Benchmarks

  CTE-IT.68.9009200.7.4 Describe selection programming structures (e.g., if/then, else) and explain the logic used for if statements.

  CTE-IT.68.9009200.7.5 Explain the types and use of variables in programming.

• Unit Outline

  
  

  This lesson is designed to be used with the case study, “Got GAME? Fix my 2D Animation Game.” See CPALMS resource ID# 219123.

• Career Connection

  
  

  Students will engage in collaborative efforts by working as a team to solve a problem. Students will share their programming knowledge, articulate the game’s objectives, and debug any errors in the game. Students will develop team building or teamwork, cooperation, and interpersonal relationships to achieve a common goal of ensuring the users are able to play a game (playability).

• Learning Objectives

  
  

  Students will be able to:

  • Explain the variable assignments associated with each sprite (animated object).
  • Describe the function of graphical programming blocks as it relates to decision structures, logic, and conditional statements.
  • Present a strategy for correcting the game’s scoring points and sprite’s movement for playability.

• Prior Knowledge

  
  
  • Students should be familiar with Scratch Animation, a two-dimensional software application to create sprites and build algorithms to create an animated sprite or object.
  • Students should know and understand the graphical programming constructs within the Scratch application.

• Guiding Questions

  
  
  • How are variables used with user input or feedback?
  • What are the functions of conditional or selection statements?

• Procedure

  
  
  1. Lesson Introduction: (See Teacher Notes before starting this lesson.) Go to the Scratch interface at scratch.mit.edu. Select the Create button at the top of the navigation bar to view the interface. Conduct a review of the graphical programming blocks shown on the left of the interface. Explain each category and color of the Scratch blocks on the Scratch interface. For example, Variable blocks are red. Variables can be assigned for changing a sprite’s costumes, pressing a key or for calculating the score. Control blocks are orange. Control blocks allow the sprite to make decisions or execute if an event is true. Also, control blocks also repeat instructions in a sequence (in order). For instance, if the sprite touches a color, then the sprite will jump. Motion blocks are blue, and they allow the sprite to move around the screen. Continue to explain each category of the Scratch blocks.
  2. Ask review questions to check for understanding about the Scratch interface for broadcasting messages, purpose of variables, if/then and repeat statements. Each student can write their answers down on a post-it notes or online platform. Give out a couple of post-it-notes to each student for students to write notes or vocabulary terms. For example, you can ask the following questions for review:
  • Which category of programming blocks are used to make decisions or repeat set of directions?
  • What type or category of programming blocks allow you to assign a number or value?
  • What is the purpose of assigning values or numbers in Scratch? Give an example.
  3. Provide students with a copy of the case study, “Got GAME? Fix my 2D Animation Game” (see CPALMS resource ID# 219123). Explain to students that they will read the issue in the case study about a Scratch game. Students will read the case independently or partner with a peer student.
  4. After reading the case study, ask the following guiding questions and seek students to respond and share their answers as a class discussion:
     • How should the game work properly?
     • What do you think the terms, ‘incorrect sequencing’ and ‘variable’ mean?
     • What are the possible errors identified in the game?
  5. Programming Activity: Set up or organize students in groups of 2 or 3. Students should gather their notes and work in pairs (2-3 students) as a programming team. Ask students to assign a team name and to identify a team captain within the group. The team captain will make sure each team member is working together. One or two team members can identify and solve errors, while another member is writing notes, and another member can demonstrate the team’s results. Monitor the group’s activity to ensure everyone is actively participating.
     • Write the team names and students who will represent the team. Put an asterisk (*) for the team captain.
     • Teams should have access to the Scratch bugged file (See Teacher’s Notes). Each student in a team is allowed to access the file individually, play the game and figure out the errors.
     • Provide the correct game rules for each team captain. Inform the teams that the score should increase by 50 points and the cat should have enough time to jump and not get caught. If the cat gets caught, the player should lose 100 points. Team captains and team members should be working together to fix the game to work correctly. One of the team members should write the errors and solutions on post-it notes or notebook paper.
     • Allow students to collaborate and identify errors. Tell students they have approximately 15-20 minutes to fix the errors. Allow one team member to visit another team as a twist halfway during the activity. Allow more time to fix if needed.
  6. Summarize the activity by informing each team that they will have to present their results in front of the class. Group presentations should address the steps the group took to find the issues, the types of selection programming structures they used, the types of variables used and how these selections enabled the game to be played correctly. Since each group wrote their errors and solutions on paper or a post-it-note, they must demonstrate how they debugged the program by showing and describing the corrected code. Each group should run and execute their program to test the playability of the game.
     • If possible, allow teams to connect their computer to a whiteboard to demonstrate how the game works correctly.
     • Annotate the errors found next to each team’s name on the board.
     • Near the end of the lesson, share the results of the debugging file. Each team may have a different result than the debug file, which is okay because there can be more than one solution. Remind students that there can be multiple solutions if the game works correctly.
  7. Closing: As an exit ticket, ask students to answer the following reflection questions:
     • Why are variables an important part of the programming process?
     • What is the purpose of a repeated sequence or iteration when developing a program?

• Teacher Notes

  
  
  1. Students should be familiar with Scratch Animation, a two-dimensional software application to create sprites and build algorithms to create an animated sprite or object. Students should know and understand the graphical programming constructs within the Scratch application.
  2. Please have the following documents or files ready before you begin this lesson:
  • • Post-it Notes or Notebook Paper for each student to write notes.
    • This lesson is designed to be used with the case study, “Got GAME? Fix my 2D Animation Game.” See CPALMS resource ID# 219123. Make hard copies of the case study for each student.
    • Students do not need to sign into a Scratch account. They can go to scratch.mit.edu or download the offline Scratch version (scratch.mit.edu/download). The offline version is available for Windows, Macs, Chromebooks and Android operating systems. It is recommended if internet access is not available or to minimize student sharing.
    • A debugged version (i.e., corrected Scratch file) and a ‘bugged’ (i.e., Scratch file with errors) are files attached for this lesson. Please make sure students upload the ‘bugged’ file, not the ‘debugged’ file.
    • Use Firefox or Safari web browser to download the attached .sb3 files. Then, import the file into Scratch by creating a new project and loading the file from its saved location.
    • (Optional) Teachers can set up a Scratch Classroom account as a portal to upload the file and monitor student activity. Students can access the file from your classroom account. More information is found at: https://resources.scratch.mit.edu/www/guides/en/scratch-teacher-accounts-guide.pdf