Week 2 Homework

Due Tuesday, May 29:

Critique

• Read: Lifelong Kindergarten, Chapter 1
• Read: The Design of Everyday Things, Chapter 1, (begins on p. 20 in the pdf)
• Read: IDEO Field Guide, pp. 1–26
• Watch: The Mad Scientist of Music

Create

Continue working on your Scratch/MaKey musical instrument with your partner. We will show off our progress to each other and to Cloud Valley teachers in class on Tuesday.

It is due Thursday, May 31 when we will be sharing our instruments with first graders and seventh graders at Cloud Valley School.

Watch the MaKey MaKey Music videos for inspiration:

Other examples:

• Noise picked up by the computer microphone moves the cat across the screen.
• Motion captured by a computer camera triggers the strings of an instrument.
• Simple MaKey MaKey instruments.
• Cognimates AI Scratch Platform

Due Thursday, May 31:

Curate

Take a picture of an object in the world with affordances. (These are discussed beginning on p. 10 in The Design of Everyday Things.) Then, include the picture in your Design Journal alongside a list of the object’s affordances. Does the object have any signifiers or mappings? What are they and how well do they work?

Create

Finalize your MaKey+Scratch instrument with your team! Remember to plan how you will present it to first graders vs. seventh graders and how to involve each age group. Also, write down your prior experience and assumptions for an individual student on the handout we provide you with in class. Post a link to your Scratch project here.

We are visiting Cloud Valley School for the entire day.

• Please meet in the lobby at NYU at 6:50am for the bus to take us all there.
• Bring writing materials, the handouts provided in class today, and make sure someone in your team is bringing a computer to run your project.
• Please bring water and breakfast. Lunch and dinner will be provided.
• The schedule for the visit can be found in the course drive.