From Blocks to Text
About
In this session, you will learn about:
- The differences between Blocks, Hybrid and Text Languages
- Why you might chose a particular type of Language to teach Coding to your students
- Examples of different Blocks, Hybrid and Text Languages
After a presentation about moving students from Blocks languages to Text languages, there will be an activity focused on Sonic Pi. Sonic Pi is a program that allows you to write music with code. Like Scratch, it’s easy to get started Coding this tool, but you can also write quite complex programs (compositions) using it.
Sonic Pi was created by a Computer Science researcher, Dr Sam Aaron. Dr Aaron also worked with educators to develop lesson plans for Sonic Pi (see the Links section below) that map to the UK’s Computing curriculum (the equivalent of Australia’s Digital Technologies curriculum).
The Sonic Pi activity will show how some of the fundamental Coding concepts can be used to create a song. The main Coding concepts in this activity, which you may remember from the Coding in Scratch Activity yesterday, are:
- Sequencing
- Repetition
- Branching
You will also learn about Threads and Randomisation, which are other concepts that are often used in creating programs.
If you complete the Sonic Pi activity before the end of the session or have already started to begin using Text languages with your students, you may be interested in the Reddit learnprogramming community’s FAQ, which offers some very helpful advice for beginning coders.
Files
- From Blocks to Text Presentation (PDF presentation)
- From Blocks to Text Activity with Sonic Pi (Word document)
Links
In this section, we have included links to websites for examples of the different types of Coding languages that are commonly used in K-12 education, as well as links to resources for learning and teaching Sonic Pi.
Sonic Pi Resources
- Raspberry Pi Learning Resources - Sonic Pi
- Mehackit’s Creative Programming Workshop with Sonic Pi
- Programming as Performance (TED talk from creator of Sonic Pi)