Alice.org

Free teaching tool from Alice to display stories, games and videos.

3D programming environment. Suitable for KS3 upwards. Free.

Alice is a pupil friendly 3D programming application suitable for KS3 and KS4. Developed by Carnegie Mellon University it is designed to offer pupils an insight into real world software design and programming.

This software perfectly fits Michael Gove’s 2012 plans to introduce programming into secondary education. A visual programming environment allows pupils to create animations, interactive games or more advanced applications. The skills used provide a good introduction to object orientated programming and will allow pupils to move on, seamlessly, to industry standard programming languages such as Java, C++ and C#.

The application offers good potential for differentiation. Tutorials are available and there are many lesson guides and examples on the website. For the more able, the programming language is open ended, and there are few limits as to the level of applications which can be realised.

Hardware requirements, network

• Windows:
• Windows 7, Vista, XP, or 2000
• Intel Pentium II or equivalent processor
• A VGA graphics card capable of high (16 bit) color and 1024x768 resolution (3D video card recommended)
• 512MB of RAM (1GB recommended)
• A sound card
• Mac:
• Mac OS X 10.4+
• PowerPC or Intel processor
• A VGA graphics card capable of high (16 bit) color and 1024x768 resolution (3D video card recommended)
• 512MB of RAM (1GB recommended)
• A sound card

This software needs to run on individual workstations. However, there are no issues saving to shared fileservers.

ICT curriculum uses and referencing

• Perfect for the 2012 programming initiative announced by Michael Gove.
• KS3 POS: 1.3 (a and b) 2.2 (b and c), 2.4 (a,b,and c)
• KS4 POS: 1.3 (a and b) 2.2 (b and c), 2.4 (a,b,and c)
Possible teaching activities and cross curricular use
• Create animated movies.
• Create interactive story books.
• Create simple video games.
• Create interactive presentations, IWB programs or ‘encarta’ style resources.
• Create ‘World of Warcraft’ style RPG games. tweet