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Appinventor and Squeak Smalltalk?

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R.D. Latimer

Appinventor and Squeak Smalltalk?

THis may be too broad of a question...
I'm working with Etoys, k-6, and wondering if there may be a
connection, even educationally, with Etoys/Smalltalk and the app
programming world, for example Appinventor?
Thanks
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Valerie Scarlata

Re: Appinventor and Squeak Smalltalk?

I'm working with Etoys, k-6, and wondering if there may be a
connection, even educationally, with Etoys/Smalltalk and the app
programming world, for example Appinventor?

Android App inventor and Etoys are very similiar in their user interface and manipulation of "objects" in terms of allowing a child to build something

You can connect them in an educational sense (or use them side by side in a classroom) App inventor is for making something that will work on an android tablet or phone. Etoys is form making something for your desktop computer. You could "compare" them by trying to make an application in etoys, and making the same application in app inventor. What is different? Why? (hint, the desktop computer does not have an accelerometer - what is an accelerometer? Excellent classroom discussion ensues....) The concepts are the same, but the implementation and objects at your disposal to create with are different. The tools compliment each other, and I would also suggest the Alice tool from carnegie mellon as well. I use all 3 of these tools to teach object oriented programming to elementary, and even middle / high school if they have not been exposed to programming. concepts earlier. Unfortunately I do not think you will ever have a tool like app inventor for Apple IOS apps due to their stringent control over publishing apps on their platform.

thanks,
Val Scarlata

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dcorking

Re: Appinventor and Squeak Smalltalk?

R.D. Latimer wrote:
>> I'm working with Etoys, k-6, and wondering if there may be a
>> connection, even educationally, with Etoys/Smalltalk and the app
>> programming world, for example Appinventor?

There are a couple of sentences in Wikipedia that highlight some
relationships. We can see that they are all of a family:

"Open Blocks visual programming is closely related to the StarLogo
TNG, a project of the Klopfer's STEP, and Scratch, a project of theMIT
Media Laboratory's Lifelong Kindergarten Group. These projects are
themselves informed by constructionist learning theories,"

You might also have noticed that AppInventor is now hosted by the MIT
Media Lab, also home of Seymour Papert (on the Etoys Vision Team) and
of John Maloney - principal author of Morphic, Etoys and Scratch. So
you never know what innovation might occur as a result of a walk down
the hall.

Finally, StarLogo inspired the Kedama objects in Etoys.

Have fun! David
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