Flappy Bird: Scratch Coding & the Engineering Design Process (Beginner)

In this course, students will learning basic coding in MIT's Scratch platform (https://scratch.mit.edu/) while also learning about the iterative engineering design process. This process involves identifying the problem, brainstorming solutions, prototyping, testing solutions and critiquing them. Students will be able to put their 'engineering hard hats' on to think systematically, logically and consider a variety of factors when choosing design solutions for their Scratch project. Students will be able to get assistance in developing their own version of the famous Flappy Bird game, with all it's features, including score, game over, and a start button. Other extensions, including a timer and lives will be discussed and introduced if time permits.  

My role in this class will be to enable students to apply their creativity in a productive way - while also learning key skills in design thinking, such as brainstorming, prototyping and communicating design solutions. In addition, as an engineer, I will take a small portion of the class to discuss potential career options in engineering - and where engineering design would be applied in these career options. 

**Note: Students do not require previous experience with Scratch. All students are welcome, as the purpose of the course is not to simply teach how to code using Scratch, but how to create a simple project, understand why decisions were made and communicate these decisions to each other.**