MIT-Google App Inventor Summer School, 2014

(report by Kathy Deng, Google China)

The six-week long MIT-Google App Inventor Summer School program was successfully completed on August 8, 2014.

HIGHLIGHTS:

For 6 weeks starting at the beginning of July, the MIT teaching team of 4 students taught App Inventor on five 3-day teacher workshops, two 1-day student summer camps and one 1-day teacher workshop, at various cities in China: Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Lanzhou. Following are the data:

• # of teachers participated: 275+ teachers (Most of the participating teachers teach Information Technology or Computer Science at their schools.)
• # of students participated: 76+ students
• # of school reached: 198+ schools.

VALUE:

These App Inventor workshops have resulted in a pool of trained App Inventor teachers, who will transfer skills to their students and advocate others to use App Inventor. App Inventor is a great tool for educating young kids. As Hal remarked during the workshop kickoff at Guangzhou on July 20: Smartphones are "super computers", every student becomes creator, not just user. The students can create something which can never be achieved before. The CS teachers will find that App Inventor is a good vehicle for educating young kids for innovation.

FEEDBACK:

• From UNIVERSITY organizers:
  The workshop format is quite different from traditional workshops in China. The workshop participants spent most of their time on practicing App Inventor 2 and creating their own Android applications by working as group. On the last day of the workshop, each group presented their applications. Thanks to the MIT teaching team who brought this new workshop format to the participants. And also thanks them for the 1:1 guidance and help to the participants.
  
• From participating TEACHERS:
  The teaching format is quite different with the traditional classroom, but it inspired the teachers to try this new teaching method in their own class. Also, we heard lots of feedback that App Inventor is easy to learn and use and it’s also a great tool for students.
  
• From participating STUDENTS:
  App Inventor tool is easy for them to do their own Android applications. Also, they are so lucky to learn from the MIT teaching team about high schools in US.

SOME APPLICATIONS from the workshop participants with screenshots:

Mole Attack, Guess Chinese idioms, Alarm Clock, Racing Car (gravity sensor enabled), Happy Birthday Card, Chinese Ancient Learning Application, To Hell with Johnny.