Scratch, the drag-and-drop visual programming language from MIT, continues to grow in popularity among teachers and students. The statistics tracker on the Scratch website shows:
- 18,688,109 projects shared,
- 15,314,275 users registered,
- 97,400,962 comments posted,
- 3,069,067 studios created
Students are creating, sharing, and remixing Scratch projects…and universities are remixing Scratch itself, building and sharing new flavors of Scratch to further expand the appeal and application of Scratch for programming.
Scratch | Massachusetts Institute of Technology
If you are looking for the original Scratch (now in v.2) this is the place for you. Create an account and begin coding games, simulations, musical instruments, and more!
Snap | University of California, Berkeley
Snap is for more advanced users who want to add their own blocks to Scratch. Built on Scratch v.1.4, Snap projects are also exportable as stand-alone apps for Windows and Mac.
Scribble | Monash University
Artists will appreciate this customization of Scratch (via Snap) that comes pre-loaded with cool red blocks for shapes, transparency and text.
No matter your students’ interests or experience levels, there is a Scratch flavor that is just right for them. Try them out and let me know what you think in the comments below!
Aaron Tyo-Dickerson 