There’s no question that families have faced disruptions and tough challenges over the last few months. For the parents and carers who’ve been supporting their children with learning at home, it can feel overwhelming, stressful, rewarding — or all three! As many children are still carrying on with learning at home, we are supporting them with extra resources, and parents with support tutorials.
In our last blog post for parents, we talked to you about debugging — finding and fixing errors in code. This week we’re covering the amazing things young people can do and learn with Scratch — it’s not just for beginners!
Getting the most out of Scratch
Scratch is a block-based programming tool that lets you create lots of different projects. It’s often one of the first programming tools children use in primary school. We’ve made a video introduction to Scratch in case you’re less familiar with it.
If your child at home is ready to try more challenging coding tasks, Scratch is still a great tool for them, as they can use it to build some truly epic projects.
In this video, Mark shows you examples from the Scratch community and signposts useful resources that will support you and your children as they develop their confidence in Scratch.
Scratch is a great tool for building complex, unique, and challenging projects. For example, the Scratch game Fortnite Z involves 13,500 Scratch blocks and took more than four months to develop. People have also built astounding 3D graphic projects in Scratch!
You can find other amazing examples if you explore the Coolest Projects online showcase. Our free annual tech showcase for young people has lots of great Scratch projects: plenty of inspiration for you and your young people at home.
Exploring and learning in the Scratch community
The Scratch community is a great place for young people to safely share their projects with each other all year round, and to like and comment on them. It’s a real treasure trove they can explore to find inspiration and learning opportunities, and for young people who are spending more time at home, it offers a way to connect to peers around the world.
In this video, Katharine shows you how the team behind Scratch keeps the community safe, where you as a parent can find the information you need, and how your child will engage with the community.
Code along with us!
To keep young people entertained and learning, we’re running a Digital Making at Home series. You’ll find new, free code-along videos every Monday, with different themes and projects for all levels of experience. We have lots of Scratch code-alongs on offer! We also live-stream a code-along session every Wednesday at 14:00 BST at rpf.io/home.
We want your feedback
We’ve been asking parents what they’d like to see as part of our initiative to support them and the young people they care for. They’ve sent us some great suggestions so far! If you’d like to share your thoughts too, email us at parents@raspberrypi.org.
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Sign up now to start receiving free activities suitable to your child’s age and experience level straight to your inbox. And let us know what you as a parent or guardian need help with, and what you’d like more or less of from us.
PS All of our resources are completely free. This is made possible thanks to the generous donations of individuals and organisations. Learn how you can help too!
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