MIT App Inventor is a program for creating mobile applications (apps) for the Andriod operating system in a drag and drop manner. It was a program which began as a Google Labs project and is now currently managed by Media Lab team at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). MIT's App Inventor provides an introduction to programming concepts where students are able "build it & test it" in real world (immediate) fashion.
Why Teach Programming Skills?Everybody in this country should learn how to program a computer. . . because it teaches you how to think. –Steve Jobs Our policy at Facebook is literally to hire as many talented engineers as we can find. There just aren't enough people who are trained and have these skills today. –Mark Zuckerberg | |
| | Canyons School District is helping interested students learn to program through an after-school called "Canyons App Club." Students from all high schools meet formally at least once a month. Jared Ward, one of the club organizers explains, "Students drive the momentum for this club, they would love to meet after-school every day!" Students in the club range from a very beginning skill level to quite advanced developing C++. In addition, some of the students have completed or are currently involved in the programming classes at CTEC. Club organizers, RachelAnn Murphy and Jared Ward, are Canyons School District Education Technology Specialists at the high school level. The idea for a high school app development club started to take form after watching a few TED Talks by kids who are currently creating apps. These students are amazing and Canyons School District has amazing students as well. And even though the district has a programming course for students, the programming courses isn't always accessible to all interested students. And so, the idea was born to start our very own Canyons App Club. The Canyons App Club is designed to provide a community of learners, a variety of resources to student, and business partnerships. Each month students earn badges as app creation levels are completed. The MIT App Inventor website provides a wealth of resources in the form of tutorials, forums, and a gallery of created apps. Each of the MIT APP Inventor tutorials teaches a certain aspect of app development and the tutorials get more complicated as they progress. After each tutorial is completed, students are then challenged to use those same concepts in an app of their very own creation. |
For example, the first badge level in the app club is called "Hello Purr" ( a creative twist on 'Hello World', the first application programmers typically create). In this app when a picture of a kitty is clicked it will purr. Once students complete this app they receive the Hello Kitty badge and then are challenged to make a similar app of their own choosing. One club student created a missile app and when a picture of a missile is clicked it sounds like a missile taking off. Another student created dinosaur app that roared when clicked. These student who have created their own app have earned the Hello Advanced badge as well as the Hello Kitty badge.
| Are you interested in playing along? Complete these levels to learn on your own!
| These resources are helpful starting points:
Kids can create apps - look below! |
By Jared Ward & Rachel Murphy
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