Scratch to Python

[Wizzabeck]

In the last week or so I have read an item about a thirteen year old boy who has developed an intermediate system that makes it easier to move from Scratch coding to Python. I thought it was in my email box but I'm unable to find it. My grandson is making the transition and I thought it might interest him. Can anyone point me in the right direction please, I'm sure it was a Pi announcement?

TIA Ken

[B.Goode]

https://edublocks.org

[Wizzabeck]

Thank you I was planning to sent that web address to his father (a teacher)anyway, but that was put together some time ago by adults. What I recently read was produced by a young boy and was being announced as "new". It's the young involvement that I thought would be inspiring.

Ken

[bensimmo]

Thank you I was planning to sent that web address to his father (a teacher)anyway, but that was put together some time ago by adults. What I recently read was produced by a young boy and was being announced as "new". It's the young involvement that I thought would be inspiring.

Ken

You would think wouldn't you
https://youtu.be/0upgQiwAE3g

[B.Goode]

The blog for Josh Lowe, the author of EduBlocks -

http://allaboutcode.co.uk


(Maybe he feels, with some justification, that his work speaks for itself and that his chronological age is not significant?)

[Wizzabeck]

B. Goode wrote:
(Maybe he feels, with some justification, that his work speaks for itself and that his chronological age is not significant?)

Well if I were a thirteen year old with two teachers as parents I'd take note of it. At 82 I still remember the put-downs ) Thanks to you and bensimmo for the input. Apologies for the delay in responding.

Ken

[ejolson]

Well if I were a thirteen year old with two teachers as parents I'd take note of it.

EduBlocks seems like a great resource. At the same time, the transition from Scratch to Python wouldn't be an issue if people didn't spend more than a week or two with Scratch. As good dance teachers, music teachers and athletic coaches know, teaching things that have to be unlearned before making further progress is often counter productive.

In case Josh Lowe is listening, another interesting programming tool might be the other way around: Python that is automatically translated to a Scratch-like graphical block-based drag-and-drop language.

[mattmiller]

At the same time, the transition from Scratch to Python wouldn't be an issue if people didn't spend more than a week or two with Scratch. As good dance teachers, music teachers and athletic coaches know, teaching things that have to be unlearned before making further progress is often counter productive.

[Forris]

EduBlocks seems like a great resource. At the same time, the transition from Scratch to Python wouldn't be an issue if people didn't spend more than a week or two with Scratch. As good dance teachers, music teachers and athletic coaches know, teaching things that have to be unlearned before making further progress is often counter productive.

IMHO Scratch does not need to be 'unlearned' when moving on to text-based languages, especially Python. Apart from the pretty graphics, a lot of the structures used in Scratch can be directly converted to Python. A 'while True:' loop, for instance is the same as a 'forever' loop in Scratch. If you look closely, you'll even notice that Scratch uses indented code in it's loops and conditional statements, just like Python. In my primary school computing clubs, I use a couple of examples of Physical Computing where the conversion from Scratch to Python is almost line-for-line.

I also feel that Scratch gets unfairly derided as a programming language. It is a lot more powerful than people give it credit for, allowing students to explore advanced concepts (multi-threading, for a start) very easily.

[bensimmo]

The things kids rapidly create in Scratch compared to just forever debugging in Python is immense.
I would rather kids learn Scratch, learn how flow, logic and programming works, how boundaries and sprites can move, how LEDs and motors can be controlled and explore their creative side, than have to worry about perfect spelling, spacing and grammar in the Python or other 'old style' text based systems.

There is plenty of time to pick up a text based language interpreter their life, if they ever need it.

[Wizzabeck]

Some interesting points of view above, thank you all. We gave my wife's grandson a Pi, keyboard/mouse and monitor a couple of years ago and I shewed him some basic command line stuff while we were setting it up together. He was already into Scratch on his father's Microsoft laptop and was encouraged to produce some simple cartoon sequences with options to change the storyline, for his father to use at school when dealing with drug abuse and similar junior school problems. We followed up with one of Simon Monk's simple kits and he brought it up on a visit and I encouraged him to try changing some of the code and left him to work out why some things didn't work. Since my first post I've heard he has started taking bits of code from Carrie Philbin's book, putting them together on a suck-it-and-see basis and has decided to do a computing/electronics course for O level. I've sent him details of the Edublocks approach and he's visiting us next month and I'll shew him how to burn his fingers with an Antex. Then I shall have to step back or be seen to be pushing him )

Ken

[bensimmo]

Then point him in the direction of his nearest PiJam...