Alice in Classroom

Hi there. I'm going to teach a "Technology Applications" class for a semester this fall. One unit I'm considering is a unit on Alice, the programming learning tool from Carnegie-Mellon. Does anyone have experience with Alice in the classroom? If so please share!

Tags: Alice, programming

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Permalink Reply by Nancy Bosch on August 5, 2008 at 6:41pm

Did you know that Randy Pausch (The Last Lecture) taught the student who developed Alice? I teach gifted kids and my 4th-6th graders used and loved Alice last year (and will again this year). We've discussed Alice HERE and HERE in this forum, you might get some good ideas.

Here is Kelly Irish's wiki on Alice

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Permalink Reply by Brian Lamore on August 5, 2008 at 7:29pm

Thanks, Nancy.

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Permalink Reply by Nicole Welding on August 6, 2008 at 2:14pm

I used storytellingalice for my middle school language arts students (7th and 8th grade)... My objective was having students use literary elements like characters, setting, etc. to create theme--but the process of learning to use storytellingalice (the version for younger students) proved to be an amazingly engaging reading activity as well. My students worked collaboratively to figure out the application--as I am a language arts teacher--I needed their expertise. Our technology teacher said he could write a course around the application, and may still... There were some issues--students lost some of their work, etc. but we just laughed it off and the students would start again--I'm not technically trained to figure out the bugs and other problems, but I would use Alice again in a heartbeat! Hope this helps a little...

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Permalink Reply by Govinda Prasad Panthy on October 27, 2008 at 9:27pm

hi dear, I feel really sad becoz i dn't understand what you r talking wi th? Alic? Storytelling Alice? What are they? i'm new to classroom2.0. and dn't have net access at school. Myself poor in technology.

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Permalink Reply by Maureen Tumenas on October 28, 2008 at 4:15am

Alice is a 3D programming application. It is free from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, PA. Although there is a free download available online, if you do not have access- write to Wanda Dunn at CMU- the leader of the project and she may be able to help you. You can also order the book- Learning to Program with Alice and you get a copy of the program with it. If you can download it- go to http://www.alice.org/index.php?page=downloads/alice2.2_info

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Permalink Reply by C. Mooney on August 6, 2008 at 3:03pm

Brian, I utilized Alice for the first time this year and enjoyed it. My high school students found it challenging and frustrating. However, once they overcame the learning curve, I was able to put some exercises together for them. An example would be to utilize the cemetery scene, insert the wolves, have the wolves run through the gates and have them import appropriate sounds. The goal is to get them used to importing wavs and syncing them in a script. Some creative students then did things like make mummies or pharoahs run at the camera, float in the air and then the students would record audio.

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Permalink Reply by Maureen Tumenas on August 6, 2008 at 3:35pm

I've used Alice in my 9th grade class. The kids had a choice of Alice or Storytelling Alice. Many choose Storytelling Alice, simply because the methods for walking, etc. are built in. One caveat with Storytelling Alice is that it is PC only and there is no support.

Either one, in my opinion is a great intro to programming, can be used for digital storytelling, etc. After learning a few basics, the kids are ready to try it on their own.

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Permalink Reply by Nancy Bosch on August 6, 2008 at 6:27pm

One thing that I'm missing is some assessment tools for the new applications. We discussed that here. Assessment 2.0 If you decide to use Alice and develop some rubrics or checklists let me know! N

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Permalink Reply by Brian Lamore on August 14, 2008 at 9:36pm

I was planning on using Mac iBooks, but I've found some bugs in v2.0 that might make this too frustrating. They also appear under Linux OS (10.1 I think). I have some Windows 98 machines that I'm going to try next. Failing that, I don't know what I'll try. I may just try Scratch.

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Permalink Reply by Julie Baird on October 28, 2008 at 4:18am

I had my German 3 students use Alice to create a story and share it with the class. Our French teacher does the same thing. I think Alice is great for critical thinking and problem solving skills. The part that I dislike is that it is so time intensive. The week my students spent creating their stories was a week where there was little German being spoken or heard. This wouldn't be a problem in non-foreign language classes.

Recently my level 2 students needed to "visually represent" a chapter in a the novel we read. A few of them choose to use Alice.

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Permalink Reply by Maureen Tumenas on October 28, 2008 at 4:25am

Have you tried the Alice 2.2 version? It's much the same, although they have added some new methods- makes walking easier and now you can export as a movie- which my kids will really like.