Karen Brennan, Amanda Valverde, Joe Prempeh, Ricarose Roque, Michelle Chung

Abstract

Being able to design interactive media is an important capacity for young people to develop in order to understand and negotiate our modern media landscape. Scratch (http://scratch.mit.edu) is a programming environment that enables young people to create their own interactive media and share their creations within an online community. In this paper, we describe the ways in which young people’s development as creators of interactive media is supported by others, using the context of the Scratch online community. Through a series of six case studies, we focus on the social nature of young people’s participation, and the shifting and unexpected roles that they take on in the community. We discuss what the case studies have in common (opportunities to imagine, program, and share) and we suggest making similar opportunities available to young people situated in other learning environments.