URL:
Topic:
KidSim
Programmers:
Allen Cypher and David C. Smith
are the co-inventors of KidSim
Summary Composer:
Sarah Andress Click here for searching strategies
100 Word Summary:
KidSim is a children's computer program that allows them to create their own worlds in which they invent the characters and control the characters' behavior. They can then play games with these characters in which the characters behave as the child has dictated. Children can create animation and sound to make their game more exciting. Allen Cypher writes of the program, "Simulations allow children to construct things, helping them attain a deeper understanding than is possible from books alone. As the poet cesare Pavese says: 'To know the world, one must constract it.' "
Children are taught to use the program with a demonstration technique in which the system is set on "record mode." Then the child goes through the program while the computer records so that users can concentrate on the game alone and not on the programming of their game.
KidSim has been changed and renamed Cocoa. Children have the option of putting their games that they create through Cocoa up on the internet.
Bibliography:
Smith, David C. and Cypher, Allen. (1995). KidSim: Child Constructible Simulations. [WWW document]. URL http://www.atg.apple.com/Allen_Cypher/Publications/Imagina/KidSimImagina.html
htto://cocoa.apple.com/cocoa/about/aboutcocoa.html