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Looking for Scratch programs to teach standard subjects

« Teaching with Scratch
1 reply [Last post]
Janissa Balcomb
Member
Most educators seem to be using Scratch to teach computer science and programming skills.  However, I'm looking for something a little different - Scratch programs to teach standard primary school subjects like math, science, ESL, geography, etc.  I'm also hoping to find programs that can serve as self-teaching lessons of these standard subjects without requiring any teacher input. 

I'd like to create an extensive collection of top-quality Scratch programs.  There are some such programs available on the Scratch website, but sorting through everything and testing the programs to find sophisticated, top-quality lessons is extremely time-consuming.

I'd like to know if anybody has put together such a collection already or is interested in helping create one.  I'm also looking for volunteers interested in helping to create sophisticated lessons that use good teaching strategies to teach standard subjects for grades K-7.

BACKGROUND:  I run a very small nonprofit that works with primary schools in remote villages in Lesotho (Africa) where there are few teachers and the quality of teaching is extremely poor.  There are usually 50-70 students per classroom and one teacher may teach up to three grades, so students get virtually no individual attention or feedback.  Practically all the students lag 3-4 grade levels behind U.S. standards.

We've set up locally-run programs that use laptops as an educational tool, not only to supplement the teachers' work but also to help the children teach themselves, requiring little or no assistance from their teachers. 

CONSTRAINTS: We are currently using refurbished One Laptop Per Child XO-1 laptops, run by solar panels.  We'd hoped the software that came with the XO laptops would be sufficient for students to learn on their own, but we've found it grossly inadequate.  There is no internet available in the area, so we cannot use web-based resources.  The XO laptops have a unique Linux operating system called Sugar.  Because of this, many existing programs and resources will not run on the laptops.  Fortunately, Scratch does run on them, though they only have Scratch 1.4 right now.

USING SCRATCH:  None of our volunteers are trained computer programmers, but some of them can use Scratch.  We'ved decided Scratch is the easiest tool for us to use to reach our goal, which is eventually to create an entire curriculum of self-teaching, interactive computer lessons. 

We've created a limited number of lessons so far.  We've found that, because the lessons offer instant feedback the students have never gotten before, their' skills improve quickly and dramatically when they use these lessons.

That's why I'm asking for your help.  It's an ambitious project, but I think it's worthwhile.  And hopefully, it is something that can be used by children and schools in other developing nations that also don't have access to the internet.
Replies
Digital K
Member
Hi, I'm sorry no one has replied until now but I'd like to try to help.
I have used Scratch for teaching many topics such as maths, science, geography and English.  Generally we have internet access but its not essential.

I've started making a small studio with examples of projects made by me and others for different topics: https://scratch.mit.edu/studios/891302/

Please let me know if that helps or what specifically you need more help with.