Only a couple of months to work!

We are getting closer and closer to the end of our year in Globaloria. Our class is becoming more hectic each day. All of you guys are working really hard at getting your games together. While everyone is working hard on your game, all of you all are competing in a STEMS game contest.  Everyone don't forget to check on the deadlines for the competition.  I would like for everyone to blog about your experiences with flash, now that you have worked through more tutorials. Also what kinds of barriers do you see to getting your game finished? What are some special effects your game will have? What do you think will be the best part of your game? Good Luck and keep up the hard work, May is only a couple of months away.

Learn while you Play?

Video games have become more and more popular in the last couple of years. We use the Wii to create exercise while playing. We are now going to try to create videos games for learning. We have all played games to try and help master an educational objective. We have all used studyisland to help use in Math and Language Arts. Now that we are creating games to help future students master learning objectives I am asking for your opinion on educational gaming. I know most students enjoy playing games while learning, but do you all feel the same?

What are some educational games you played?
Do you remember anything you learned while playing a game?
Do you think games can create a learning atmosphere?

Game Presentations Preperation

It is the middle of the year, so you know what that means, Game Demo presentations.  Many of the teams are almost completely ready for presentations.  Hopefully the rest will be ready by Thursday.  Although we are in a run of four snow days in the past week and a half and that may set us back a little.  I really enjoy game demo presentations for several reasons.  The students realize that there are several other people monitoring their work, and that gives them more motivation.  Also the Globaloria staff always offers great suggestions for all of the teams.  The most important part, in my opinion, is that it always raises student engagement and excitement levels.  I am hoping that all of my students will be in attendance for demos and will receive some great information about their games. I will post all of the game demos to viddler to allows all of my students to add them to their team page.

Adding Animation and Sound

After a few struggles and a loss of excitement, adding animation and adding sound has helped regain students engagement. As stated earlier, many students became frustrated with flash programming. After the unit on adding animation, they now enjoy working with flash. To this point Adding Animation has been the most enjoyed unit the students have worked through. I had to force them to continue on with the course schedule. They all wanted to continue to make animations and show what they had done. Adding sound has also been a fun topic for the students. I am glad that these two units are placed where they are in the curriculum. Both years I have taught Globaloria, students became frustrated around the same time. I think we are back on the correct path and hopefully on our way to success.

This year in Globaloria

Once again in the beginning of the year student excitement was at a high level.  All of the students are working hard and seem to be enjoying the class.  They update their blogs and wikis continuously, as this still seems to be their favorite part of the course.  When we started working with flash, I saw many similarities from last years group.  The start of flash usually brings a little frustration to the class and student attitude seems to be at its lowest.  This only lasts for a small time.  I feel that I have done a better job this year utilizing Globaloria helpdesk, which has decreased some of the frustration.  I am confident that this years class will be just as successful as last years.

Creating Game Scenes

Many of my students are working hard on creating their scenes in flash. They have really enjoyed drawing in flash and creating objects for their game. We are having a few technical difficulties when it comes to uploading projects to our page. Although there are a few teams that have their scenes posted to their team page.I did not have this many problems last year uploading to projects page. We are working through our struggles and making some progress. I have learned a few things from last year. I am making sure students are given plenty of time to finished topics. Last year I felt that they were rushed and needed more time on certain topics.

Math topics for 7th grade students

The groups have been set and students have now chosen their math CSO that their game will be based on.  Last year I made the mistake of letting my students choose any math topic they wanted, well we ended up with games that were for students in elementary school.  My last year students worked really hard, and were very successful.  I just wanted this years students to create games on their grade level.  We walked through all of the seventh grade content standards and each group picked one for their game.  We have games on topics such as graphing, taxes, tips, discounts, scientific notation, and integers.  No more than two groups are working on the same topic.  We have a wide variety of topics and I am really excited about of the game ideas.  There are a lot of creative minds in Globaloria this year, so I have high expectations for them all!!!!