Through our work LTC has developed an engineering-design continuum to support our mission:
Play » Tinker » Make » Engineer »
This continuum is supported by a pedagogical approach to develop resources and environments that support the facilitation of inquiry moving into design experiences for learners
Inquiry » Design » Engineering Design
In the News
It was a great Scratch Day 13.
We had 3 different activities ( actually 4). On the 5th floor, visitors came in and could try Scratch with the Scratch sensor board - making music with the Fruit Jams project and the example project that came with Scratch 1.4 ( we used the earlier version with the sensor board and Wedo) next to that we had our Wedo Scratch drivin’ game.It truely was amazing - no explanation - just a big screen, a Scratch driving game and a plastic plate steering wheel. Kids about 3- 4 years old all the way to elders came up and tried to stay on the road.
On level 4 Cindee and Oanh introduced Scratch 2.0 with video - control projects. We played with a remix of the balloons project - butterflies and flower ( yumm!) and as you can see we had folks naturally gesturing and moving and waving their hands and arms to guide the butterflies into the flowers.
Finally we had Scratch Joke Book. Create your own animated Scratch joke and get some Laffy Taffy for inspiration and as a prize for your humor. The joke project published to a website for sharing: www.scratchjokebook.com
It was a good day, with visitors being very comfortable and curious about Scratch, with some expert Scratchers showing us what they knew and with terrific volunteers who shared the wonder of ( computer programming and computational thinking) Scratch for the day! Good day and thanks for the continued great work, Scratch team !
KAYSC youth testing the #scratchday wedo racing driving game
I’ve had 4 conversations in the last week, and its a conversation that I seem to have every 6 months, about art (or objects) and museums. The first conversation of this go around came after visiting the More Real? Art in the Age of Truthiness at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts. I really liked a lot of the pieces in the exhibit (and one piece in particular that used museum exhibit creation as its medium) but what I liked equally as much was the curation of the exhibit. Most of the pieces were accompanied by a small didactic which provided a bit of context about the piece. Not telling you what to think or feel, but giving a little bit of background to direct your experience with the piece. The conversations always circle back to the artist’s intent, the viewers experience, blah blah. I’m sure you’ve had this conversation before.
This morning, I saw this TED Talk by Jay Silver come across my Facebook feed. I’ve played with the MayKey MayKey a little bit and its been on the floor of the museum with a banana piano and ice-controlled Pacman, but I hadn’t thought much about it. After watching this video, hearing more about what led to the project, and how Jay and Erik are thinking about the MayKey MayKey, I’m excited to explore with it more.
Special effect and stop motion innovation Ray Harryhausen passed away in London today. Check out his animation in this clip from Jason and the Argonauts.
