Help the cat get home safely!

This warm-up exercise will help your youngest students better grasp the idea of basic motion blocks (moving up, down, left and right).
This is an offline exercise that you can do before you start your pupils on the tablets.
Best for individual work or work in pairs.

What you’ll need:

• worksheet print-outs
• set of small coding blocks (motion blocks only) for each student

You can use your laminated coding blocks if you have them already (you can find small printable coding blocks in this post), or students can cut their blocks themselves, as part of the exercise.
This will add and arts and crafts element to the exercise.

The activity is a simple one. The blocks need to be arranged in such a way that the cat walks home without bumping into any of the walls.
If your students don’t know yet that the number arguments under blocks represent the number of steps taken by a character, you can leave those blank and assume that each block stands for a single step.
Naturally, this solution will call for longer scripts, so if you choose to do it this way, make sure your pupils have enough blocks to build from.

Next, you can encourage your pupils to define the number of steps.
If you use laminated blocks, they can write the numbers on small pieces of paper and stick them to relevant blocks with a bit of sticky putty.
If students cut their blocks themselves, they can simply write down the arguments with a pen.

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I’ve prepared two different worksheets. Each has the cat and the house in different positions. You can download them for free, simply fill out the form below.

When your pupils are finished with the offline activity, you can try a similar one, but this time with your tablets, using ScratchJr.
Students can work in pairs.
 – Each student creates a new project, placing the cat and the house on the screen. Next, they edit the background and add a few “walls” or other obstacles.
 – In pairs, students then exchange tablets and try to beat the challenge set up by their partners, by putting together a script that takes the cat home.

How did your students like this game? Let me know in the comments!

Happy coding!