Background: This Scratch Project is part of my T550 course at Harvard School of Education. Purpose: I created this project for my 8 year-old brother, Chiang, who is learning English in our home country, Thailand. In his English class, his teacher is teaching him some Pirate terms to build up his vocabulary. However, I noticed that he doesn't understand what they mean, especially since they are not used in his context and daily conversation. He is also medically diagnosed to be having ADHD (Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder) and this means he can't focus the same way some of his classmates do. What I did: So, I decided to incorporate his English lesson into some fun,interactive games that I hope he will learn to understand the words better. Having ADHD means more than having a learning disadvantage. I see it as Chiang having a diverse set of skills that can give him the extra advantage in life. But, there are many challenges in the education system that cannot help him nature his uniqueness. Thus, I hope that this project will also inspire educators and friends to explore different mediums of teaching, as well as have fun teaching!
This project could not be possible without my best buddy, Justin Alcala. He has been my Scratch "co-conspirator" since my undergrad days in programming. He is a great teacher, breaking down complex programming concepts and patiently teaching them to me. My cool codes would never work without him!! Huge thanks and appreciation to Justin, a superb and talented programmer-n-best-of-friend in the U.S. army! Images of the Spirtes and Backgrounds are from Google. Credits go to the rightful owners. Feel free to take the concept/whatever you think is useful/remix/etc. and give me & Justin the credit~
