We are Programming in Alice 2.0!

We are working with Alice 2.0 (2.2 since the latest upgrade) to learn programming.  At first, I thought it was a little hokey, but I knew it was going to be better for me to learn visually.  The dashboard for the program looks like something out of 1993:

So here we go.  The upper left corner contains the objects list for use in the world that is created in the middle pane.  The lower left corner shows the properties and pre-written code, called "methods" and "functions", displayed in tiles that can be dragged into the Programming pane, like a storyboard.

I worked tonight with Samantha in class and we had a good giggle over creating a man using the "Hemaker" feature. 

I feel pretty comfortable with this simple program, and I like how you can playback the program at different stages.  At one point, I had made our man, Nigel, walk forward three paces, turn, and face Zena.  When I played it back, only Nigel's legs moved.  I was able to troubleshoot right away.  But I had to laugh watching Nigel move torso-less toward Zena.  We replayed that a few times before I changed it.

Meantime, I will have to troubleshoot over the weekend why she keeps saying the same thing over and over and over.  It seems to be looping.  I will play with it and see if I can fix it.