On Saturday, Decemeber 13th we held a Video Game Design Workshop at the Lillian Marrero Neighborhood Library. We helped facilitators from E-Line Media kick off their national workshop tour to expose youth from grades 5-12 to basic game design principles and the National STEM Video Game Challenge. Unfortunately the boiler was going out at Marrero, but we had a great… Read more →
Month: December 2014
Beyond Making
Currently, I work for the Paschalville neighborhood library and most of my time is spent as a Digital Resource Specialist helping job-seekers write resumes and apply for jobs. A lot of what I do in this position is help patrons navigate web sites and fill out forms for employment opportunities. One of the most common questions I receive is, “What… Read more →
The Challenge of Making Content Creators
Last week at Lillian Marrero Branch, we worked with one of Mozilla’s Webmaker tools, PopcornMaker. PopcornMaker allows you to “remix” music and videos off of Youtube, Vimeo, SoundCloud, etc. The interface is very simple and easy to use, and it can be fun and exciting for youth to play with their favorite music videos and online content. It could also be… Read more →
Keep Calm, Love Fashion
At Marrero we accomplished something great: a completely youth driven longterm project! Without any prompting or cajoling by Mentors, two participants decided that they wanted to plan a library fashion show. Other participants quickly got on board, and we started the planning process. Together, we made a sign-up for participation, a task list, and a list of items to be… Read more →
What’s Been Going on at Paschalville
The past two months at the Paschalville Neighborhood library have been super fun! Participants have engaged in a diverse range of activities including song writing, recording, beat making, storytelling, programming, pico-cricket boards, stop motion, and more. Here’s a soundcloud playlist with some of the stories and songs we recorded in September. [soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/playlists/57797206″ params=”auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false&visual=true” width=”100%” height=”450″ iframe=”true” /] … Read more →
Talking About Ferguson in Informal Learning Settings
A big part of Maker Jawn’s function is to create safe spaces for program participants to not only learn new skills and work on projects, but also to hang out and chat about whatever happens to be on their minds. With the unfolding events in Ferguson and around the country, kids have been coming in wanting to talk about what… Read more →