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The Power of Scratch

Among other languages, here at Educademy we offer courses in Scratch, a basic language mainly used by younger children new to coding to build their own animations and games. It teaches the underlying principles necessary for all coding using a colourful drag-and-drop block structure. Nonetheless, once proficient, it is possible to create some extremely impressive projects. Here are just a few examples of the work that can be done, simply using Scratch!

A common use of Scratch is building the coder’s own version of famous games. Here, @HyperPixel has recreated the notorious Flappy Bird game, adding their own features to make it unique. Whilst this project is complex, we teach the principles required to build it, and students are even given the opportunity to create a more basic version during the Intermediate Scratch: Games and Animations course.

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Scratch is also used to create interactive animations. Users can draw or upload images of their characters and backgrounds and make them engage with each other and the person watching. Throughout all our courses, we encourage students to use their creativity to personalise the projects they are creating. Below is a project created by @ihtmason which uses the pen feature.

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Scratch can be used to make any number of incredible projects, including story games and games with multiple levels. In the project below, created by @Raysworkshop, your character must make their way out of a castle dungeon, defeating knights and collecting coins and potions on the way. Whilst we set the tasks on our courses, we encourage our students to personalise the story lines and aims of the game so that all their creations are unique.

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Scratch is a unique tool that can teach children as young as 7 the founding principles of code, whilst being enjoyable and interactive. Having taught them the necessary skills, our students will be fully equipped to continue building and improving. Learning Scratch is also an excellent gateway to learn more advanced languages, and the principles remain the same. You can discover even more incredible projects here, and all our courses here.