Sorry your browser is not supported!

You are using an outdated browser that does not support modern web technologies, in order to use this site please update to a new browser.

Browsers supported include Chrome, FireFox, Safari, Opera, Internet Explorer 10+ or Microsoft Edge.

DarkBASIC Discussion / Teaching DarkBASIC: "...and bring that big juicy chess club brain of yours"

Author
Message
Uncle Setnakt
20
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 10th Jun 2004
Location: Eastern U.S.
Posted: 24th Sep 2004 01:05
Link
RIP Teachers' Forum.

We're about to start an after-school class/club for DarkBASIC programming. I'd like people's advice on how to proceed, what to tackle first, etc.

Available resources: 1 copy of The Big Book; sufficient seats of the schools edition of DB (Classic?); (relatively) eager students.

Particular challenge: at least 1 of the students is rather advanced, 1 is in the middle, and 3 are pretty much clueless.

For extra credit: engineer things so the students' scores in reading and math get jacked way up to appease the Great God Testing.

Yrs,

Unc
Back to top
Profile PM
BatVink
Moderator
22
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 4th Apr 2003
Location: Gods own County, UK
Posted: 24th Sep 2004 01:31
Link
First piece of advice: You are going to struggle to please all students if they are at different levels. Can I suggest the more advanced students writing functions that can be used by the lower level students. This way, the advanced ones have something to get their teeth into, the lower ones can achieve more, quicker, by plugging in more advanced functionality. You could even get the intermediates to program a "test rig" to get both sets interacting. That is, a piece of code to test the advanced functionality in a bare but working environment.

Secondly, I would suggest a project that involves mathematical calculations to position objects, provide acceleration, or some other curriculum based topic. The testing Gods will be pleased.

BatVink
http://biglaugh.co.uk/catalog AMD 3000+ Barton, 512Mb Ram, 120 Gig Drive space, GeForce 5200 FX 128 Mb, Asus A7N8X Mobo.
Terms & Conditions apply
Back to top
Profile PM Email
BearCDPOLD
21
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 16th Oct 2003
Location: AZ,USA
Posted: 24th Sep 2004 08:06
Link
Assign different project for each group, based on skill level.

One interesting thing would be "The Math Homework Machine" in which you can feed it information about any number of problems and it will spit out the right answer, that might be good for the advanced/intermediate students. That should boost their math scores.

For beginning students they could make a text adventure and use all proper English, and have the adventure be English related and devise grammar puzzles to solve.

Crazy Donut Productions, Current Project: Project Starbuks
Sony stole our name!
Back to top
Profile PM Email Website
The Wendigo
22
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 13th Sep 2002
Location: A hole near the base of a tree in the US
Posted: 24th Sep 2004 08:15
Link
Students will want instant results. I think instead of doing just text based things, why not let them get into some really neato programming that has to do with pretty graphics. Find yourself a nice picture artist and get married... wait, no... have that person create some cool 2D spaceships and characters and stuff. For the first lesson, you could do some kind of little car game so there isn't much animation to deal with and then work your way up to animation and mathmatics. DB is awesome because you can achieve great results with little effort, and that is what the students will love. I can blit an image of a car on the screen in two lines of code, and can make it move around in only a few more!

For the advanced students, have some extra credit by having some advanced tricks they can do, or better yet, tell everyone to get as creative as they want and give EC on creativity. As far as mathmatics and logic goes, there will be no problem with that advancing with your students as programming in general will eventually make you a much better problem solver and help you with math.

Current Projects: Verious things right now. Lots of utils for game making. Hopefully something solid soon.

http://www.geocities.com/djpeterson83
Back to top
Profile PM Website
blanky
20
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 3rd Aug 2004
Location: ./
Posted: 26th Sep 2004 19:13
Link
i no wot i wanted when i first bought DarkBasic.

I wanted it pretty much soon after i bought Visual Basic.

* 3 D *

u no in the FastTrack tutorial thingy in the DB helpfile or the little greyscale book? Mod the code of the endless landscape a bit. Change colours, etc. Add a third person char., make jump? w/e.

then i think you should move onto designing a small platformer, probably 3d from scratch or something.

[img src=http://blanky.pt-web.net/ddd.gif] >::p
Back to top
Profile PM Email Website
Osiris
20
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 6th Aug 2004
Location: Robbinsdale, MN
Posted: 30th Sep 2004 13:12
Link
the testing gods LOL

anyone can be a hero, but a soldier can be a hero five minuets longer....
Back to top
Profile PM Email Website
Van B
Moderator
22
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 8th Oct 2002
Location: Sunnyvale
Posted: 30th Sep 2004 23:53
Link
I'm considering the best way to get my little brother (12yo) and my son (8yo) involved in their game idea. The thing that becomes very apparant is they both want to do the same thing, whatever the other person is working on is always cooler than what they've been *lumbered* with. I think the important thing is to keep them interested by giving them smaller tasks that don't take quite so long, so if they're doing something a bit boring, at least they know there'll be something else to try when they're done.

If you start with some very basic demos, then decide on a project you can then get them started on level editors and other editors that they might need, things like models and textures will be vital, so don't forget the less-code orientated members might be pretty good artists or musicians or testers or designers. Basically keep the work varied but give everyone something to get their teeth into - otherwise you'll have an ego battle on your hands. Make sure everyone knows what everyone elses tasks are, and drum into their heads the importance of teamwork, maybe have a little meeting once a week to update on everyones progress too, that way they'll be more inclined to have some input, don't have emergency meetings, because that can cause more stress than anything.


Van-B


Muhahahahaha.
Back to top
Profile PM Email
SandraD
20
Years of Service
User Offline
Joined: 30th May 2004
Location: Down on the corner, out in the street.
Posted: 2nd Oct 2004 13:39
Link
I'd have to agree with Van B in that aspect of game programming, and especially, add the importance of good planning for modular design. If the game is constructed in a modular fashion, the code snips required would be smaller, where each participant can test on their part before submitting the result to the group. This is of course how all large projects are handled in professional circles, so it would be a good foundation for later experience.
S.

Any truly great code should be indisguishable from magic.
Back to top
Profile PM
Back to top

Login to post a reply

Server time is: 2025-05-24 17:52:24
Your offset time is: 2025-05-24 17:52:24