Lifelong Kindergarten

At Computer Clubhouse after-school centers, young people (ages 10-18) from low-income commmunities learn to express themselves creatively with new technologies. Clubhouse members work on projects based on their own interests, with support from adult mentors. By creating their own animations, interactive stories, music videos, and robotic constructions, Clubhouse members become more capable, confident, and creative learners. The first Computer Clubhouse was established in 1993, as a collaboration between the Lifelong Kindergarten group and The Computer Museum (now part of the Boston Museum of Science). With financial support from Intel Corporation, the network has expanded to more than 100 Clubhouses in 20 countries, serving more than 20,000 young people. The Lifelong Kindergarten group continues to develop new technologies, introduce new educational approaches, and lead professional-development workshops for Clubhouses around the world.

We are creating an online community, called the Computer Clubhouse Village, to connect people at Computer Clubhouse after-school centers around the world. Through the Village, Clubhouse members and staff (at more than 100 Clubhouses in 21 countries) can share ideas with one another, get feedback and advice on their projects, and work together on collaborative design activities.

Imagine that a full computer (with touch screen, sensors, keyboard, and everything else) was simply just another craft on your craft table. How would you use it? Computer crafting weaves together full computers with regular paper and markers, textiles, and everyday objects. By using computers as just another craft, the everyday world can be programmed and combined with computers.

DesignBlocks is a derivative of the Scratch project that focuses on 2-dimensional digital design. With DesignBlocks, artists control lines, shapes, colors and images to create generative and interactive artworks. DesignBlocks uses the same visual grammar as Scratch, but uses a vocabulary more suited for graphic design. Inspired by Processing, DesignBlocks aims to make programming more accessible and suited to artists.

Drawdio is a pencil that draws music. You can sketch musical instruments on paper and play them with your finger. Touch your drawings to bring them to life—or collaborate through skin-to-skin contact. Drawdio works by creating electrical circuits with graphite and the human body.

The Hook-Ups system is a set of technologies and activities that enables young people to create interactive experiences by programming connections between physical and digital media. With the Hook-Ups system, young people integrate sensors with a myriad of materials to create their own tangible interfaces. These interfaces control digital images and sounds based on computer programs the young people write to make projects such as games or responsive art pieces. For example, a 10-year-old created a paper-plate-based flying saucer, added a sensor, then wrote a program to control an animation of a flying saucer on her computer screen.

How can we help people reflect on their own learning process? The goal of this project is to develop new technological tools and pedagogical strategies to cultivate reflection. Jots are brief updates that people write as they use our Scratch programming environment, to describe their thoughts, frustrations, and excitement. Users' Jots are displayed on their Scratch user pages, so they can explore their own processes and share them with others.

We are developing a special version of our Scratch programming language to enable people to create, play, and share interactive media on mobile devices. Mobile Scratch is designed especially for interacting with the outside world, taking inputs from microphone, camera, and external sensors, and communicating with other mobile devices. We are running an initial pilot project at an innovative school serving children in low-income communities in India.

This project explores the relationship between empathy and civic engagement. We have designed and implemented a seven-part workshop to foster mutual understanding, collaborative problem-solving, and self-expression. The curriculum (which employs Scratch as a central tool) builds capacities in three areas: programming, storytelling, and perspective-taking. Throughout the workshop, participants use a variety of tools and techniques to engage in acts of personal expression by creating rich, interactive, multi-threaded narratives.

Scratch is a new programming language that makes it easy to create interactive stories, games, animations, and simulations—and share your creations online. Scratch is designed to enhance the technological fluency of young people (ages eight and up), helping them learn to express themselves creatively with new technologies. As they create and share Scratch projects, young people learn to think creatively, reason systematically, and work collaboratively—while also learning important mathematical and computational ideas.

With the Scratch Board, people can use sensors to control interactive stories and games that they create with the Scratch programming language. By connecting the physical and virtual, the Scratch Board extends the range of what people can design -- and extends what they learn in the process. The Scratch Board comes with several built-in sensors: a light sensor, sound sensor, touch sensor, and slider. It also has four ports where you can plug in your own resistance-based sensors. For example, you can create a Scratch program that controls music and animation on the computer based on your interactions with sensors connected to the Scratch Board.

Scratch Day is a network of face-to-face local gatherings, on the same day in all parts of the world, where people can meet, share, and learn more about Scratch, a programming environment that enables people to create their own interactive stories, games, animations, and simulations. We believe that these types of face-to-face interactions remain essential for ensuring the accessibility and sustainability of initiatives such as Scratch. In-person interactions enable richer forms of communication among individuals, more rapid iteration of ideas, and a deeper sense of belonging and participation in a community. The first Scratch Day took place on May 16, 2009, with 120 events in 44 different countries.

The Arduino platform makes prototyping and tinkering with electronics open to more people, but its complicated programming language is a barrier to entry. Building on the graphical-blocks programming language developed in the Scratch project, we are creating a new, more accessible way to program the Arduino, so that more people can become "makers" with electronics.

Although we designed Scratch primarily as a means for personal expression, a growing number of high schools and colleges (including Harvard and Berkeley) are using Scratch as an introduction to computer science and programming. The Scratch4CS project explores the question: "Can we design a Scratch-like language suitable for a full-semester introduction to programming and computational thinking?" This question is particularly relevant now since there are several initiatives underway to rethink introductory computer science courses and advanced-placement exams.

What if everyone could create their own interactive content in virtual worlds? We are putting the playful and intuitive features of Scratch into a new programming language for Second Life. We hope to make it easier for everyone to create their own interactive virtual pets, dancefloors, games, clothing, houses, and whatever else they can imagine.

As Scratch proliferates through the world, there is a growing need to support learners. But for teachers, educators, and others who are primarily concerned with enabling Scratch learning, there is a disconnect between their needs and the resources that are presently available through the Scratch Web site. In July 2009, we launched ScratchEd, an online environment for Scratch educators to share stories, exchange resources, ask questions, and find people.

ScratchR is the engine behind the Scratch online community, enabling people to publish and share the interactive stories, games, and animations that they create with the Scratch programming language. Unlike other user-generated content communities, ScratchR makes it easy to reuse, remix, and build upon other people's creations — a process we call creative appropriation. ScratchR is to programming what YouTube is to video production. Although ScratchR was developed with Scratch in mind, it could be reconfigured to share videos, images, or any other type of media.

Twinkle is a new system that lets users program using crayons, LEGOs, or anything that has colors—like a striped shirt or fall leaves. Users can compose a song with markers, program a robot by drawing instructions on paper, or create a custom interface for a program just by doodling.