Here’s an little animation from Lizzy and Michelle. I’ve started teaching the girls Flash, with the idea of using it as a way to introduce them to programming. I was about Lizzy’s age when I first started programming computers. Of course back in those days if you wanted to do anything at all with a computer you had to write a program first. These were TRS-80’s and the language was BASIC, and we’d type in the source code for simple games like Lunar Lander out of a manual and then watch it run. Now computers, languages and platforms are about a zillion times more complicated, and it’s hard to know where to start. I figured Flash is good cuz they can start with the drawing and animation tools, and then get into simple frame scripts, and go from there they can take it as afar as they want, up to a full on Object Oriented language and web application development platform. Not that they will necessarily want to grow up to be software developers, but right now they mainly use computers for watching DVD’s, playing games, and surfing the net, so it’d be good for them to have some basic understanding of how things work, as well as developing some logical problem-solving skills.
So we’re up to playing with the drawing and animation tools. Here’s a first effort, called “Squishy Cheese”. The project is actually from a little while ago, but there is renewed interest, and they’re working on a follow-up. The new one will have thematic content and an attempt at narrative. This one is more, stream of consciousness and impressionistic.
