Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year from IT Kids

Card Art

 

These are only two of the twenty designs Athashia created this term as the theme was card art. Athashia was therefore the winner this term with her stunning creations and she received a set of her work printed on cards with envelopes. The children created some wonderful art with the following programs: Picasa, Inkscape, GIMP, Paint Shop Pro, and the above images were created with Paint.net. We collected these designs in a folder and we use this card art to create more cards in the future.



Art cards made by our tech kids



Athashia's price. A set of 20 printed cards
with her art

We had a little end of year party at the last session. The children ate cookies and drank some juice and we talked about what they liked most this year. Google Sketchup was the most popular software this year followed closely by GIMP.

Fun with photos

At our computer Club we also had a photo shoot. We collected some props the children for the children to dress up and the photos were inserted in a template or online into photoFunia
Here are some results

 

 

Using Gimp

We practised using GIMP which is free Open source software. It is graphic design software, like Photoshop. It takes some practise but you can do really cool things with it when you get to know it.

We learned to cut out a picture with a white background using the magic wand in Gimp. 

We saved it as a paint brush and printed it.

 

 

We took it a step further and used the pictures they cut out, to past them on a background.

A term full of creativity

This last term we've been busy with graphic design which is the art of combining text and pictures. We were having fun being creative and in the process learn different ways of working with software like GIMP, Paint Shop Pro, Picasa, Publisher and Paint.net.

We learned to copy and past photos on a background and used the paintbrush and the paint bucket in Pain Shop Pro

 

Francesca's work

 

 

Jordan's work

Roberts work

Trimble Sketchup contest

Term 3 was all about 3D design and again we had a little contest for the best Trimble Sketchup designers. If we look at the work from last year and this year we can see a lot of progress. Have a look yourself in our slideshow which contains the work of our young designers.

 

  and the winnners are......roffle....roffle....
Nathaniel with his mansion
Jacob with his castle
Francesca who designed the whole of Addington
JesPol who made a whole neighbourhood, including a hospital

By Nathaniel

 

By Jacob

 

The first time Jacob gave us a big smile on a photo. He is one of the winners of a 3D drawing pad, funded by Supervalue, Lincoln Road
Well deserved Jacob. Your castle is awesome.

3-D design with Blender

Last week, Garry taught us the basics of Blender. Blender is a free Opensource 3-D computer graphics software programme. You can creat 3D models with it. If you are an advanced user you would be able to make films and video games with Blender.

Garry showed our members how to creat a person in 3D. He started with a sphere and pulled out some arms and legs and a head. It was a steep learning curve as we had to learn a lot of new tools.
The kids also had a go at sculpting and modelling the head.

Several kids managed to create their first 3D model. This one even has eyes and a mouth.

 

 



 

Nathaniel took it a step further and created a monkey.

 

 

Next week Garry will show us the basics of animation with Blender



Parenting week

Addington.net attended the expo held at Addington School on Sunday 11 August, to inform the parents about what Addington.net can do for their children.

 

A demonstration of people engaged in Information technology at the Expo :)

 

 

At our Club we invited the parents during parenting week and the children had a go at teaching their parents some of the skills they learned at IT Kids Club.

 

We gave the parents and kids a break and shared some pizza with them which was kindly donated by Domino's Pizza.

 

After that the children took the opportunity to demonstrate the work they had done on the big screen

and told the parents a bit about it.

 

We don't know if we turned the adults into Wiz-parents but if so than they can come back in the future at night as we are setting up a Club for adults as well.

3-D design

Term 3 is all about 3D design. The major programs the children will be working with is OpenSim, Google Sketchup, Blender and some online programs.
The children have a lot of fun with OpenSim or OpenSimulater. This is a free open source 3D server. Children can use it to create a virtual world.
They can use the “sandbox”  Here the children create objects like planes, pets and clothing. They can also use coding to help them doing that.
Multiple users can enter the virtual world, develop their own person and interact with each other.
The objects the children have made with Google Sketchup or Blender can be loaded into OpenSim. The program has become very popular in our ITKids Club.

 

 

This 3-D world is a combined creation of the students 

Garry helping with OpenSim

All sorts of 3-D objects can be created in this virtual world

 

 

Frequently asked questions about OpenSim are here, if you want to know more about it

Dance video

We have been so busy that we neglected our Blog a bit so we have some catching up to do.
We want to show you a dance movie made in term 2. Three Students did some film work and cool dancing outside the IT Kids Club. The film was loaded on the computer and into Windows Movie Maker. The kids learned to split up the film, rearrange it, delete and copy parts. They added transitions as well. Levi made an intro and music was added to create a real Gangman style. An enjoyable result we think.

Animation Clips

Term Two has been a bit of touch and go for us here at Addnet, but the ITkids have been revving along with their animation.

They’ve been exploring the world of clay and styx animation and enjoying the different results that the two programs produce.  

Clay animation is exactly what it sounds like. Our kids made the clay figures and then manipulated them into different positions. This was then filmed to create a lifelike animation. 

Here’s a project that three of our kids have been working on. It’s a dramatic endeavour by Nathaniel, Seth and Levi. 

 

 

 Styx animation involves the manipulation of stick figures to create a short film. It’s a simple but effective technique, as Athashia and Jessica’s work shows us in this next clip. 

  

 

 

Great work, guys! 

Animate it!

Last week marked the start of term two for the IT Tech Kids here at Addnet Digital. This term is all about animation – video animation, clay animation, stop motion. You name it, these kids are animating it. 

A new term for the ITkids at Addnet

Several of the kids have already started some projects on different kind of animations. Watch this space for their upcoming videos! 

Addnet Digital, which is made up of pre-high school and high school kids, has embarked on making a short film. After coming up with the story, the kids have been experimenting with the filming, lighting and different camera angles. The finished project will be posted on youtube and on this blog. It's a silent horror, so be afraid. Be very afraid. 

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Award Ceremony

This term our theme is audio and video. In the first session we focused on making a stop motion movie with stick figures.

We also had an award ceremony for the best Kodu game development from last term and the first prize went to...........roffle.......roffle........Joseph, who developed the game "Kodu Gauntlet". Nathaniel won the second prize for a game where a Kodu had to eat the fishes in a pond. The prizes were sponsored by Supervalue Supermarket on Lincoln Road, Addington.
Greg presents the winning game to you on youtube:



Building circuits with Arduino

Our newest toy is an Arduino which some students are already enjoying.

Greg worked with some of the kids on a circuit with the Arduino and a Sparkfun electronics kit. Arduino is open source electronics for creating interactive objects.

A bunch of very intent people building their first circuit

Making a little light show

 

Janet has been working with Addington Digital students on film making. Here they are learning about panning and lifting. They made the first shots of their short movie

Presentation time

We are nearly at the end of the first 12 sessions of the year and this was presentation time. The children are encouraged to show their work and explain what they've made.They are allowed to demonstrate how to make something and if it's a game, they show how to play it.

 

We had several presentations today. A couple of children wanted to finish their Kodu game first and so they'll get a chance to show it next week. 

 

Some of the girls have been making posters with Paint Shop Pro, slideshows with Microsoft PowerPoint  and Piper-Rose wanted to show her bookmark.

A field trip to Orion Health

Last Thursday we went on a trip to Orion Health. Since the beginning of this term we've been learning about programming. The kids learned to code with Kodu and Scratch. They learned how to make apps and had a play with Turtle, a learning environment for Python for children.
What could be better than visiting the professionals to see how real programmers work? So we did just that.

We had a 10-minute walk, then on our arrival, Michael from Orion was there to welcome us.

At the headquarter we found the programmers at work. Our curious kids had a closer look.

The children seated themselves around the boardroom table, where they learned about some of the developers' projects. We learned that design is as important as programming and that every project gets chopped up into manageable parts. Each team works on a separate project. The kids asked lots of questions and when Samantha wanted to know the names of the teams they took this on as a new idea and will bring it to the meeting next time.

 

Having had a productive time, we took a photo of ourselves and the programmers before we left.

Some houses the young kids have made in google sketch up.

Trimble Sketchup Work on PhotoPeach

 

 

 

The most popular software at IT Kids' Club is Trimble Sketchup, which Trimble took over from Google. Sketchup is a 3-D modelling application for professionals. Professionals? Yeh, that's what our kids are. We have a few specialists in the Club. These kids are keen to help others, as the adults are not as advanced as the children. Just watch the video and enjoy their great work.

They could easily compete with the professionals, don't you think?

Coding a game and an app for your mobile phone

The IT Tech Kids at Addington.net have dived straight into 2013, taking on a ton of new and exciting projects.

This past week, Levi, one of the students, has been involved in making a video of the game he made with Scratch. It’s a game he has been working on for three weeks, and this is the final result. He’s rated it an impressive 5/5. Check it out:

Our kids use Scratch/BYOB an extended version of Scratch. It is an easy to use programming language. The children can drag and drop blocks of code to build their game or story. It stimulates their creativity, thinking skills and of course it teaches them the basics of programming or coding.
 

The kids were also introduced to Thomas Suarez, the tech-whizz whose app-creating powers can’t fail to inspire. Thomas’s eagerness, interest and ability are a reflection of what kids are capable of if given the right opportunities. 

After watching the video, the IT kids are rearing to get started on their own apps, and have set their sights on the MIT App Inventor as their next goal. They are going to follow the first tutorial to make a cat which meows when you point to it with your mouse. This app will be shown on a simulator once finished.

The kids are also working with Kodu, so there are more exciting results to look forward to.
Stay tuned to see what the IT Kids will be coming up with next!  

Addington Digital muso

 

Asoono is a member from the Addington Digital group at addington.net.
He uses his lunch time at school for guitar lessons held by a teacher and also sometimes uses the Internet to learn new songs and chords to play for the group.
In this photo he is concentrating on the lessons he is watching on YouTube.

You can find out more about the Addington Digital group at www.addington.ithothouse.com/