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What are those Sin, Cos and Tan operator blocks? In this Scratch operators tutorial, I walk you through what they are and what to put in them. We'll also look at their alter egos the asin, acos and atan functions. We'll use the unit circle to help build our understanding and list to inspect all the different values. This tutorial will set you up to graph the functions in Part 2.

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Scratch Clones and Local Variables Tutorial

Have you worked with clones in Scratch before? Trying to target individual clones can be tricky if you've not done it before. 

If you're a little stuck or curious, then check out the first video for the new year on Scratch clones. It'll form part of a series dropping over the coming weeks. You'll also gain some insight into local variables.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rQsMSamqDvM&list=PLSgUBfi51uld33-nckgzOb3f78mRHtODK&index=4

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Simple State Machine Example that uses Scratch

In this video, we’ll explore a high-level understanding of what a state machine is. A state machine defines conditions that certain somethings can be in. For instance, we can have a character who has a walking state and a jump state. We can define these states and play animations on key presses. I’ll define what states are using the familiar concept of traffic lights then transfer that understanding across to games and Scratch. Lastly, we’ll go through what’s needed to create the foundations of a simple state machine in Scratch that utilises the state design pattern. 

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14 Creative Makey Makey Ideas for School

In this video, I walk you through 14 different ideas that you can use with JoyLabz’s Makey Makey. Most are suited for school and can easily be adapted. The cool thing is that all these ideas come equipped with an Instructable guide that you can just print off to complement the activity. We’ll tour around the Earth using Google’s earth.google.com/web which is just a stunning browser experience. 

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15 Cool Makey Makey Project Ideas on Instructables

Check out these 15 cool Makey Makey project ideas that you can use to jazz up your STEM sessions. Each idea is ready to rock n roll with guides on the Instructables website. Educators, get news and resources sent straight to your inbox here: http://bit.ly/SurfSubscribe

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Educational Gifts for Kids and Cool Tech Gift Ideas for Boys, Girls and Students

On the hunt for some educational gift ideas that are some of the best tech gifts for 11 year olds — give or take a few years? In this video, I’ll go through two devices: the BBC micro:bit and Makey Makey, which I’ve used in the classes where I teach. Kids are super sparked when they see these devices come out. What I really love about them is that they ask people to interact and connect to the physical world. That means that we’re in action of problem solving the challenges the environment throws at us. I’ll take you through the pros and cons of each device as well as sharing some FREE resources that will get your gift receiver up and running with each device. Teachers all around the world are using these cool educational gift ideas for students so you can’t go wrong with either!

https://www.surfingscratcher.com/gifts/educational-gifts-for-kids/

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Makey Makey Graphite Drawing Tutorial | Makey Makey Interactive Art

In this Makey Makey basics tutorial, I’ll use inspiration from the book “20 Ways to Draw a Tree” by Eloise Renouf to make a graphite pencil drawing that is connected to Makey Makey. I’ll use the 4 Seasons as the theme for this piece. We’ll check out the YouTube audio library as well as Zapsplat for some sound effects to play with our art piece. Lastly, it’s time to synchronise our works of art with Scratch and bring them to life.

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Fun Makey Makey Projects | Makey Makey Operation Game Scratch

In this tutorial, we’ll create an adaptation to the game operation that uses a van as the subject and some van items as the objects that we’ll need to collect. We’ll use some conductive materials such as paper clips, tin foil and tweezers to construct our game. We’ll connect the tweezers to the earth connection and all the sides to the space button. If we collide with the sides then we lose a life. We’ll also create a place to drop the objects once we have received them.  

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Electrical Circuits Worksheets | Makey Makey Lesson | Scratch Coding Operation

What is the product?

This resource contains 6 worksheets that accompany an online video tutorial that your learners can watch and experiment with.

Assessment rubric for Scratch and Algorithms.

What materials are needed?

Makey Makey

Conductive Materials like copper tape, foil

Cardboard/pizza box and paper.

Sharpies or markers.

Glue

You will need computer access and familiarity with Scratch

I’ve…

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How to Make a Makey Makey Piano including Bananas

In this Makey Makey basics tutorial, I’ll show you how to use Makey Makey to create a keyboard using Scratch. We’ll use sharpies and paper to create our piano. Then we’ll grab some conductive materials like paper clips, foil and copper tape. We’ll wire these up to the Makey Makey and associate these buttons to notes in the Scratch music extension. Lastly, I’ll play an Ode to Joy by Beethoven to demonstrate our working piano in action.

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Electrical Circuit Activity | Simple Circuits | Makey Makey Lesson Plans

Electrical Circuit Activity | Simple Circuits | Makey Makey Lesson Plans

What is the product?

This resource contains 4 worksheets that accompany an online video tutorial that your learners can watch and experiment with.

What materials are needed?

You will need a Makey Makey

You will need some conductive Materials like copper tape, foil, graphite pencil.

You will need computer access and familiarity with Scratch

I’ve organized a kit so that you can pick up all the…

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How Does Makey Makey Work and How to Use Makey Makey with Scratch

In this Makey Makey Basics tutorial, I’ll introduce new learners and educators to the Makey Makey device. We can connect the Makey Makey directly to the computer as it is essentially a keyboard or mouse. We can immediately start using the Makey Makey, by touching the ‘Earth’ connection and one of the input buttons. The reason this works is because electricity flows through us from the ground connection to the input button. We complete a circuit. A circuit is essentially a flow of energy. With this understanding, we are ready to test and explore some other conductive materials. We’ll look at all things metallic, as they are fantastic conductors. These include copper tape, tinfoil and even a dense graphite pencil. We’ll look at fruit as well as water and play doh. Anything that conducts electricity will work. Some insulators (non-conductive materials) include wood, glass and plastic. Makey Makey is compatible with all major operating systems: Mac, Windows, Linux, Google Chromebooks. It isn’t officially supported on mobile and tablet devices. 

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Electric Circuits 5th Science | Circuits worksheets | Makey Makey Lesson Plans

What’s Included?

This resource contains a lesson plan and  2 worksheets that accompany an online video tutorial that your learners can watch and experiment with.

What Materials?

You will need a Makey Makey

You will need some conductive Materials like copper tape, foil, graphite pencil and play doh.

You will need computer access and familiarity with Scratch

I’ve organized a kit so that you can…

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Scratch Flappy Bird Game Tutorial for Microbit aka (LEDdy Bird) PART 2

This video is part 2 of the LEDdy Bird for micro:bit game. In this tutorial, we'll move the obstacles from right to left across the micro:bit. We'll then look into some collision detection for when our bird collides with the obstacles. If our bird makes it through an obstacle then we'll increment the score. We'll also create the conditions to start and end the game, so that we can have continuous and looping gameplay. Let's get coding!

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Scratch Coding Worksheets & Scratch Maze Game Video Tutorials

Scratch Online Project Editor | Getting Started with Scratch 3 Basics

In this series, Surfing Scratcher shows your learners how to make a maze game from Scratch using video tutorials. The key components include:

  Levels 3-6

if/then/else (Branching)

Repeat blocks (Looping)

User input (Keypresses)

Event Blocks

Sensing Blocks

  The worksheets focus on branching (making decisions). There is also an assessment rubric that you can use as well as a student…

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Place Value Activities: Printable Number Expanders

Place Value Activities: Printable Number Expanders

Extending Place Value

Research reports that many children lack an understanding of the relative sizes of numbers greater than 100. 

(Fuson 2003; Payne & Huinker 1993)

One way to counter this is to have students to manipulate materials that model large quantities. This allows students to develop a visual conceptualization of large numbers. A number expander can be used alongside the materials…

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Place Value Activities: Printable Number Expanders

Numbers expanders can be used as a simple aid to show the many ways to represent the same number using expanded notation of place value.

Place Value names and combinations.

Expanded notation.

Many ways to represent the same number.

The importance of zero.

Combine place value with this craft activity that your students will LOVE ❤️.

Print the dragons onto coloured A3 paper.

Print…