How to teach children programming: Kodu Game Lab is now available for PC
I already wrote about teaching children to program on the basis of Logo. However, another, even more “cute” approach is possible - this is visual programming , in which there is no need to write text at all. And the visual is not necessarily drawing flowcharts! For example, one can proceed from the concept of an object that is in different states and reacts to external events.
Microsoft is also thinking about the problems of teaching children, in particular, it has already been written about the Kodu Game Lab project. Kodu is an interactive 3D game creation environment, available simultaneously on Xbox 360 and on PC. I decided to write more about it, since starting today, anyone can download and try the PC version.
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How does the game on Kodu? To develop a game, you essentially need to create a game world in which the characters you introduce will live and interact according to the rules you set (as well as taking into account the laws of physics). When you start the game for the first time, you can load many existing worlds, or you can start from an empty world.
Objects live inside the world - they can be egg-headed “ code ”, apples, trees, cannons, shells, etc. Objects are already endowed with some behavior - for example, a gun added to the game world may suddenly turn over onto its back and “smile” by itself. Other actions you can add - for example, when you press the spacebar, you can ask the cannon to “fire” a projectile, and when you press the arrows, you can turn around. The projectile, by default, when faced with some object will explode, reducing the “health” of this object. When health is reduced to zero - the object itself will die.
All this is the default functionality - so in order to get a working game, you need not so much - to put objects in the world and give them minimal behavior. In response to events (keystrokes, mouse movement, collision, etc.), you can ask objects to disappear, to experience emotions (yes, “smile” is a primitive action, and different objects do it differently!), Move , disappear, or move to a new state (which is called a page in the code).
The above screenshots demonstrate the whole process of creating a shooting game on the Code: create an empty world, add objects (a tree, then a cannon), modify the properties of a gun, add a reaction to the keys - that’s the whole game! And the process is shown in more detail in the video (I recommend watching YouTube in HD):
What do you think - is this approach to game creation close to programming? Can this be seen as a learning programming, or rather as a way to drag children from the passive role of the player to the more creative process of creating the game? It seems to me that the most important thing that Kodu allows to do is to show that a computer can be used to create something new, to put its ideas into practice . Specific technologies, programming languages and libraries will change all the time, but this principle - freedom of creativity, the ability to create a virtual creation with your own hands - will always remain.
Microsoft is also thinking about the problems of teaching children, in particular, it has already been written about the Kodu Game Lab project. Kodu is an interactive 3D game creation environment, available simultaneously on Xbox 360 and on PC. I decided to write more about it, since starting today, anyone can download and try the PC version.
')
How does the game on Kodu? To develop a game, you essentially need to create a game world in which the characters you introduce will live and interact according to the rules you set (as well as taking into account the laws of physics). When you start the game for the first time, you can load many existing worlds, or you can start from an empty world.
Objects live inside the world - they can be egg-headed “ code ”, apples, trees, cannons, shells, etc. Objects are already endowed with some behavior - for example, a gun added to the game world may suddenly turn over onto its back and “smile” by itself. Other actions you can add - for example, when you press the spacebar, you can ask the cannon to “fire” a projectile, and when you press the arrows, you can turn around. The projectile, by default, when faced with some object will explode, reducing the “health” of this object. When health is reduced to zero - the object itself will die.
All this is the default functionality - so in order to get a working game, you need not so much - to put objects in the world and give them minimal behavior. In response to events (keystrokes, mouse movement, collision, etc.), you can ask objects to disappear, to experience emotions (yes, “smile” is a primitive action, and different objects do it differently!), Move , disappear, or move to a new state (which is called a page in the code).
The above screenshots demonstrate the whole process of creating a shooting game on the Code: create an empty world, add objects (a tree, then a cannon), modify the properties of a gun, add a reaction to the keys - that’s the whole game! And the process is shown in more detail in the video (I recommend watching YouTube in HD):
What do you think - is this approach to game creation close to programming? Can this be seen as a learning programming, or rather as a way to drag children from the passive role of the player to the more creative process of creating the game? It seems to me that the most important thing that Kodu allows to do is to show that a computer can be used to create something new, to put its ideas into practice . Specific technologies, programming languages and libraries will change all the time, but this principle - freedom of creativity, the ability to create a virtual creation with your own hands - will always remain.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/80832/
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