Re: FLASH: A teacher replies to Cheri et al…

[Tom Green]

Cheri Harder wrote:


<snip>


butprobably not the time, nor the know-how of writing tutorials) I don't think


> I would know where to start.


Cheri: You start at the beginning. Step1- Open Flash.


>  As a "geek" so to speak (and a poetic one at

> that) I have been studying "variables" and "While Loops" and Cursors and

> Case and If..then..else for 12 years.  It would be difficult to know where

> to start in a tutorial.  Do you start from "this is what a variable is" or

> do you assume they know some programming terminoligy?


Here's a little technique I use to get the student to understand a variable. I

tell the student a variable  is simply a baggie that holds information. The

neat thing about it is that it can be given a name. Rather than get them

thinking tecchie, I usually use "ScumSuckingPig" as the name. This has become

so popular that the students usually work in a drawing of the class mascot- a

ScumSuckingPig. Quite effective. As an aside, when the college submitted its

application as an Authorized Macromedia Training Centre, we submitted a video

of me running a complex Director coding class. We hit a custom variable -

moveIt- and when I asked the class for another name, they said, in unison,

"Scum Sucking Pig". So somewhere at the mothership is an example of the

ScumSuckingPig.


> How much do you assume?  Nothing?


Yes. You can't go leaping into John's stuff, for instance, without a logical

progression. The first ActionScript command I teach is stop.Then I move into

the button actions to navigate. Then, step-by-step, I inch them closer to

John's preloader.


People learn by doing so each lesson has a unique project associated with it.

One of my groups had their  first ActionScript class yesterday. We created a

simple Flash Movie that involved a spinning record that moved offscreen into

place. ( Importing .ai art, creating symbols, creating movie clips, using

motion tween) . A tone arm runs onto the stage. ( Creating a button with no

down state. Defining a hit area. Using Transform or the rotate tool). The logo

fades onto the page. ( Setting and tweening Alpha). The user is prompted to put

the tone arm onto the record. ( Enable Button Actions). And when the arm goes

on the record a sound plays. (Import a sound)  When they roll off the sound

stops. As you can see the first step is Assemble the Assets but there are a

whack of fundamentals involved.


Now they code it. Put a Stop action in a keyframe on an Actions layer. Add a

label to a Frame. Open the instance of the the button and add Go to and Play

Actions using the labels. Add a Stop Sound Action and a Go To and Stop. And so

on.


That one takes three hours to get through but the students have a pretty neat

example  and a clearly documented step-by -step they can refer to.


> Then each and every tutorial would be a book and a half?


Not really. I have written handouts that are as small as five pages- tracing

variable valuables using the Message Window in Director- to 64 pages where the

student constructs a Space Invaders game using Object Oriented Programming. The

tonearm example is 12 pages with screen shots that is laid out in Pagemaker.

The key, is to have each lesson build upon the other.


>

> Action Script is not really a language, even.  But it makes some use of some

> "basic" programming theory and we are learning daily how to adapt what it

> DOES do into what we NEED it to do.  And there are "basic programming"

> tutorials all over the place.


You and a couple of others who waded into this (Tim Allen for one) are missing

the point of my post. I will continue developing my own stuff simply because

nothing exists. I am more concerned about those who aren't in my classes and

wonder "How do I code a simple rollover that calls a URL". These people are the

vast majority of Flash users. Read the posts. It is very clear where they are.

They  will have to learn ActionScripting and aren't programmers. So where do

they pick it up in a manner that they can understand?


I am encouraged to see the mothership (Thanks Eric) has noticed this but there

are three places where they should be tried out before they are released. The

first is in a real live honest to God secondary and post secondary  classroom .

The teacher will let you know, real fast, what works and what doesn't work and

why. The second would be to do some beta testing. Shoot samples out to people

on the list and ask them to walk through it and let you know what works and

what doesn't. The third is to get the guys writing these things to do it in

front of a class that is coming at the subject cold. You get enough "I don't

get its" and you quickly identify that maybe we have a problem here


>

> I've never been a teacher, and it very easy for me to get into the rut of

> assuming my listeners know what I'm talking about, when it is so much a part

> of my life that I can't imagine someone NOT knowing.


Cheri, you didn't "know" when you got into to programming.


> Teaching is easier for

> you, because that's what you do, and I'm sure you do it very well!!!


Thank you.


>

> Tutorials written for geeks by geeks helps us geeks and are appreciated very

> much (I don't know anybody who gets paid for writing them, maybe some do)

> but I think we're all still learning, yes?


Yep, but the vast majority of the learners aren't even close to your

competency. We sometimes forget this.




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