TurtleLab Lessons

Eighteen steps with TurtleLab, the block drawing tool where a turtle draws what you tell it. Each step starts from a sample you change, and most have a real TurtleLab built into the page, so you can change a demo and run it without leaving the lesson.

The steps come in four units. Each unit ends with a capstone: a project of your own that uses everything in the unit.

You need a computer with Chrome and a pencil. There is nothing to install. Every step ends with a way to keep a PDF of your work.

Steps

Unit 1 Tell the turtle what to do

Give the turtle exact steps, repeat yourself with loops, let chance draw, and make the program choose a path. You finish with a picture that uses a loop, random and an if.

  1. Your initials
  2. Say it once
  3. Let chance draw
  4. Choose a path
  5. Capstone: random art

Unit 2 Remember and reuse

Keep numbers in boxes, count with them, teach the turtle words of your own, put a loop inside a loop, see that color is three numbers, and hunt down bugs. You finish with a picture made from a box, a block of your own and a loop.

  1. Variables: boxes that keep a number
  2. Boxes that count
  3. Teach the turtle a word
  4. A loop inside a loop
  5. Color is three numbers
  6. Find the bug
  7. Capstone 2: boxes and blocks

Unit 3 Listen to the person

Ask the person using your program for a number, and make your program react to clicks on the paper. You finish with a program that does both.

  1. Ask for a number
  2. Click to draw
  3. Capstone 3: ask and click

Unit 4 Make a game

Use and, or and not to decide whether a click hit its target, steer a snake with the keyboard and a timer, and finish with a game of your own.

  1. Catch the square
  2. Steer the snake
  3. Capstone 4: make a game

Print all eighteen steps · Print the planning sheet for the first capstone · Print the worksheet for Steps 2 to 4 · More samples to try

For teachers

For teachers: the sequence, assignment text to paste into your class site, and a substitute day plan.