Debugging Activities

Tags: Scratch; projects; no$; computers; Junior; Intermediate; assessment

What we think: Debugging is a vital concept in coding as well as in life. Learning to try again and again and
not to be dismayed when things dont work out as expects are skills we all need whether we are coders or not.
There are two sets of activities for learn to Debug. They are found in the two versions of the curriculum guides.
Links and information about both are included in this file. At the end we have designed a worksheet to use for
these activities to use in addition to the information provided. Besides having students find the bug in
projects having students code their own projects with bugs will show a deeper understanding of coding and
logical thinking.
A link to information in the Scratch Wiki for Debug is: https://wiki.scratch.mit.edu/wiki/Debugging
The 2011 version link: http://scratched.gse.harvard.edu/sites/default/files/curriculumguide-v20110923.pdf
A 2011 draft curriculum guide. In it, on pages 58 to 62 there are five Bug (debugging) activities. These are
screen shots of coding that dont work. It is a good assessment piece to see if your students are learning to use
the Scratch blocks. Can they look at coding and determine what is wrong or what the result will be when the
script is carried out?
For example, on Page 58 Bug #1 Farooq wants his cat to rotate when he presses the space bar. But the cat isnt
moving! Whats going on? Here is the screen shot of the script (Note: because this Curriculum Guide was
developed in 2011, the Scratch version at that time is 1.4, so the screen shot will look different from the current
version 2.0 used now).

On page 63 is the final challenge Design your very own puzzling Scratch program to debug.
The 2014-2015 version Link: http://scratched.gse.harvard.edu/guide/files/CreativeComputing20141015.pdf
Here is the cover:
The Debugging activities are developed for each unit.
Unit 1: Exploring, Debug It! on pages 34 & 35. Studio examples: http://scratch.mit.edu/studios/475483

Unit 2: Animations, Debug It! on pages 50 & 52. Studio examples: http://scratch.mit.edu/studios/47553
Unit 3: Stories, Debug It! on pages 64 & 65. Studio examples: http://scratch.mit.edu/studios/475554
Unit 4: Games, Debug It! on pages 86 & 87. Studio examples: https://scratch.mit.edu/studios/475634
Unit 5: Diving Deeper, My Debug It! on pages 106 & 107.
Here is a screen shot of Unit 4: Debug It! 4.5 and the instructions for that particular project from page 87 in the
guide.

Here are screen shots of part of the pages so you have an idea of what to expect.
Scratch is a project of the Lifelong Kindergarten group at the MIT Media lab. It is available free at
http://sctach.mit.edu

To this end we created a two worksheets, one for the student who creates (Creator) the bug and the other for the
student or students who find the bug (considered the term Debugger but settled on Analyzer just to avoid any
problems with the term! ) and fix it. FYI: The worksheets were made after working with the 2011 version but
before seeing the 2014-2015 version, so you might not see the need to use them if you have the 2015-2015
handouts. Here is our worksheets to use with your students to create their own Debugging task.
Debugging Challenge Task: Creator Name: _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
We have just solved several Debugging Challenges. Not it is your turn to create a Debugging Task for the
students in our class. You are to code a Scratch Project that contains a BUG or BUGS. Once you have coded
your project you will need to take a screen shot of the project and copy it into a word processing file. Add a
suitable lead-in that contains a hint or suggest of the original aim of the project so that someone searching for
the bug will know where to start.
A description of the bug I want to create:

Sketches of my Bug:

What should be happening? What should be happening?

What is happening? What is happening?

Whats missing or incorrect? Whats missing or incorrect?

Debugging Challenge Task: Analyzer Name: _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
The name of the project &/or creator I am debugging is: _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Here is what I found:

Here is how I debugged the problem:

I found this challenge:

Very easy Easy A little difficult Somewhat Difficult Exasperating
Difficult

I found the clarity of your instructions:

Very Poor Poor A little unclear Somewhat Clear Very Clear
Clear

I found the coding you used:

Very Confusing Confusing A little logical Somewhat Logical Very Logical
logical