Lesson Overview | Tirohanga Whānui
Ākonga launch the assessed challenge, define an audience and purpose, set three measurable specifications, sketch the algorithm and build one complete interaction before adding extras.
Seminar focus: design before build
Ākonga plan an outcome on paper — purpose, users, constraints — and critique each other's plans against those constraints.
- Unplugged Seminar move: Design brief with stated constraints, peer-critiqued
- Evidence it produces: A plan revised in response to a specific critique, with the change named
Lesson at a Glance | Te Hōtaka
Ngā Whāinga Ako | Learning Intentions
- Translate an audience need into testable specifications.
- Plan an algorithm containing sequence, loop and conditional.
- Build and test a minimum viable digital outcome.
Do Now: Need or feature?
7 minSort each phrase: “younger learner can practise kupu”, “score variable”, “clear keyboard control”, “animated background”, “visitor knows when an answer is correct”. Which are user needs, features or specifications? Rewrite one feature as an observable user result.
Activity 1: Lock the brief
13 minOpen or print the Interactive Outcome Challenge. Choose a quiz, tutorial, interactive story, simulation or small game.
Audience
Name a real group you can test with, or use a fictional audience when privacy or permission makes that safer.
Purpose
Finish: “This outcome helps ___ to ___ by ___.”
Specifications
Write three measurable results, including one accessibility or usability requirement.
Permission gate: use only self-made or reusable media. Local stories, place names, reo recordings and community knowledge require appropriate authority.
Activity 2: Plan the code spine
12 min- Draw the start event and reset state.
- Add the shortest complete path a user can take.
- Mark one sequence, one repeated action and one condition.
- Label expected outputs after each user input.
- Partner trace: navigator acts as the computer and identifies the first hidden assumption.
Activity 3: Minimum viable build sprint
22 min- 0–5: Build a reliable start and one user input.
- 5–12: Complete one if/else response.
- 12–17: Add one purposeful loop.
- 17–22: Run the same start-to-finish test twice and log actual results.
Stop adding art, extra scenes or scores until the core interaction works. Driver and navigator rotate after each passing checkpoint.
Exit: Checkpoint evidence
6 minShow the teacher or a pair: one working input → decision → output path. Record the current blocker and the first test you will run next lesson.
🎯 Curriculum Alignment
Designing and developing an outcome through spatial and product design, materials, foods, biotechnology, systems, or digital tools
This is the core development evidence. Accessibility specifications also prepare statement 51629. See the unit map.
📦 Materials & Resources
Resources already provided: project brief, planning sheet, test log and rubric; Scratch, devices and headphones if sound is used.
📊 Assessment and Success Criteria
Paearu Angitu | Success Criteria: I can name audience and purpose, write three testable specifications, map required constructs, and demonstrate one complete working interaction.
♿ Inclusion, entry and extension
Entry: Offer a starter project with reset, movement and prompt blocks ready to rearrange. On-level: Require the complete construct set and core path. Extension: Add variables, broadcasts, clones or a second pathway only after specifications pass. Chunked checkpoints, visual schedules, low-sensory media and oral/paper planning support neurodiverse learners.
📋 Teacher Planning Snapshot
Approve briefs quickly: audience, purpose, permissions and three specifications. Keep scope small enough to finish next lesson. Do not require Māori themes; require ethical authorship and manaakitanga for the chosen user. Save a local copy before class ends.
📚 Sources and teaching basis
Scratch for Educators. Constructionism gives the studio its making spine; ako and whanaungatanga are enacted through reciprocal roles and user-centred feedback.