Merge

The Judson Community Center is a pretty cool place. The center provides after school care and summer day camp programming for kids in and around the Judson community.  Thanks to our YMCA alum Matt, I had the opportunity a few weeks ago to teach an hour-long computer class for three straight days. The premise was to provide safe and creative programming on the internet so the center could better utilize their great new computer lab.  I think we succeeded.

There were just under twenty kids in the class, right around fourth-grade level. I decided to introduce them to a few web-based applications that I figured might be fun for them, yet still give them some real-world skills they could draw upon later. To that end, we played around with three web apps over the three days:

1. Sumo Paint - This is a painting and graphics program similar to Photoshop, but with some nice extra features compared to a lot of similar apps on the web. It has several tools that make it easy to create symmetrical elements, such as snowflake patterns, so that kids can more easily create something striking in short order. Two girls in particular created a pretty sweet image.
2. Soundation Studio - This app was a major hit with the class. It is a music editing program complete with plenty of free samples and really nice usability, so in no time the kids were creating some really impressive tracks. I was really pleased with how quickly everyone picked up on the basics of making their own music, and how enthusiastic they were about it.
3. Xtranormal Text-to-Movie - This one was probably the big winner, and why wouldn't it be? This app lets people create their own animated movies by selecting and customizing two characters, then typing in their dialogue. The scene can be further adjusted by adding background music, sound effects, and gestures for the characters. The kids produced a bunch of hilarious videos, but the one below stands out as a favorite.

Overall we had a lot of fun, and the kids amazed me with their creativity and the ease with which they learned these new apps. Perhaps some of them will be inspired to pursue art, music, or animation and writing in the years ahead after getting a glimpse of how enjoyable those things can be.

Bottom Line: The web is full of wonderful tools that are not only useful, but a lot of fun. Take time out of your normal web-browsing routine to give them a shot. Maybe you too will find inspiration!