July 18th, 2008
Very nice
Want to save this for teaching in the fall….
June 17th, 2008
Playing with Alice
Alice is cool. There is no doubt about it, and I am trying to decide if I should use it in my teaching in the fall. One thing that we tried last term (to various degrees of success) was to create interesting alternatives to the paper and pen resume – largely inspired by this example.
There are several thresholds for students to get over when using Alice. Walking through the tutorial, the interface seems so easy, but when I tried to use it from scratch, the threshold to make your objects do what you want them to do is a bit difficult. I am sure that is part of the learning process, but it will take a bit of time to get the hang of. Another ‘problem’ I have with this platform is the inability to output files in a movie format. I read on the FAQ that this is something they are working on, but for the moment your only choices are to use screen capture software or to export as a webpage. Neither option is super exciting.
That said, I still have high hopes for Alice, and will continue playing with the platform until I get an animation I am satisfied with. The concept of drag and drop learning is a good one, and one that I think students will benefit from.
This site is one researcher's wanderings through participatory media. Focusing on youth created media, I will use this blog to document my study of YouTube and related video hosting sites.
