[MWForum]Introducing MW 2.0

Fri, 30 Aug 2002 16:30:18 -0400

I used to start the school year with an animate-your-body project that
everyone loved (grades 2 - 5).  Here are the steps we followed:

1) I took a digital photo of each student and placed these in a folder.
The rest of the steps were done by the students.  (Of course they could
take digital photos of each other, for that matter.)

2) Import your photo into MicroWorlds.

3) Use the drawing tools to erase around your head, leaving only the
head.  (Efficient ways to get rid of chunks of background include
drawing white rectangles or using the selection tool then deleting.  We
traced around the head with a fairly thin eraser and then retraced with
a wider eraser.  The students also learned to use the selection tool and
then double-click to go into the "fat bits editor" for pixel by pixel
fine-tuning for perfectionists.)

4) Copy the head into a shape, put it on a turtle, and resize it to the
desired size for the next step.

5) Drag the head to the upper part of the page, stamp it, then drag it
away.

6) Draw a silly body under your head.

7) Surround the whole body and head with the selection tool, copy and
paste into a shape.

8) Click once to select that shape, edit -> copy, then click once on a
new shape and paste a second copy of the shape.

9) Open the shape and flip it to its mirror image.

10) Name both shapes.

11) Write one or more procedures to animate yourself.  We used several
in conjunction with a "speed" slider (with a maximum of 10 in this
example).  We put each procedure name on a button and set the button to
"many times."  The students could click on one or more buttons at the
same time.  Here are some we used:

to dance
setsh "person1 wait (10 - speed) / 2
setsh "person2 wait (10 - speed) / 2
end

[[You can just say "wait 1" or whatever, or "wait speed," but this way
the higher number gives a faster speed, and at least on a PC, the speed
that is wait 1/2 ends up looking very good.]]

to cartwheels [[for this we made more copies of the person and rotated
each 90 degrees]]
setsh "person1 wait (10 - speed) / 2
setsh "person3 wait (10 - speed) / 2
setsh "person4 wait (10 - speed) / 2
setsh "person5 wait (10 - speed) / 2
end

to throb [[version 1]]
setsize 30
setsize 35
setsize 40
setsize 45 (etc... up to:)
setsize 60 [[or whatever]]
setsize 55
setsize 50 (etc.)
end

to throb [[version 2... set the throb button to "once," not "many
times"]]
if size > 60 [shrink stopme]
setsize size + 2 wait 1
throb
end

to shrink
if size < 20 [throb stopme]
setsize size - 2 wait 1
shrink
end

to move
seth 90
fd 1 (or whatever... remember to set the button to "many times")
end

to hop
seth 20
glide 100 1
seth 160
glide 100 1
end

12) Create a textbox and write something about yourself.  Change the
text size, style and color.  Make the textbox transparent.  Drag it away
from your animated body.

13) optional:  Draw a background scene.

This project took about 4 sessions to complete.  It introduced the
students to almost all of the multimedia capabilities of MicroWorlds and
a few of the primitives.  The kids LOVED it!!!!

Later on they made animated stories in which they imported each other's
silly bodies and had their cartoon friends peopling their stories.

Another extension to this animated-self idea was to apply the same
strategy to social studies projects, in which students animated
something relevant to their studies, along with a text box of
information.  For instance:  animated cave paintings, or Egyptian
gods...  importing (and then adapting) graphics from the Internet.

After the animation project, I always went into turtle geometry, and the
kids were wowed by the power of MicroWorlds to create exciting designs
with a few simple commands.  I'll save those starter procedures for a
follow-up message.

You can also get quite a few ideas, I think, by visiting the MicroWorlds
project areas of the two sites I've been working on (below).

I'm sorry we were not more responsive to your first request!!  In my
case I was indeed stumped by the Montessori tie-in.  Any of these
MicroWorlds projects lend themselves well to individual adaptations, of
course... lots of room for creativity and extra challenges.

Wendy Petti
Math Cats - http://www.mathcats.com
(with MicroWorlds projects at http://www.mathcats.com/microworlds.html )
MicroWorlds in Action - http://mia.openworldlearning.org

> -----Original Message-----
> From: mwforum-admin@lists.mathcats.com
> [mailto:mwforum-admin@lists.mathcats.com]On Behalf Of Lauren Pacini
> Sent: Friday, August 30, 2002 2:50 PM
> To: mwforum@lists.mathcats.com
> Subject: [MWForum]Introducing MW @.0
>
>
> How good it is to see that there is life in turtle
> land! Perhaps now would be a good opportunity to
> repost my prior question... but to open the parameters
> a bit.
>
> I am new to MW and am looking for some basic starter
> project suggestions for grades 4-6. Something that
> will light the imaginative fires of the students as
> well as their teachers.
>
> What is the best way to present MW as a brand new
> tool. I mentioned that I am in a Montessori school,
> and I suspect that may have been responsible for the
> lack of suggestions, but it is important that MW get a
> good launch in order to getpast the skeptics!!
>
> Suggestions would be greatly appreciated!!!
>
> Lauren
>
>
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