Prototype Makey Makey, a simple invention kit for the classroom that helps students turn everyday items into keyboard buttons, to bring Scratch programming projects into the real world and engage your students.
Use the framework “just right” to encourage students to take on challenges and create projects at their skill level.
Compare variables to gym scoreboards to help students understand them and how they can be used in a game.
Ask students if the games they are designing are games they’d want to buy to keep students making progress toward your learning goals for them.
Sequence your curriculum using ideas you and your students come up with while brainstorming to keep your course aligned with your students’ skills and interests.
Break necessary skills for students down to a meaningful difficulty level to motivate students designing games.
Organize curriculum around building a one-level mini-game to introduce elementary school students to introductory computer science.
Have students design projects based on content from their other courses, and have them brainstorm how the code they write might be useful in a variety of fields. This broadens their understanding of CS’s many applications.