TY - JOUR AU - Rusk, Natalie AB - Programming by Choice: Urban Youth Learning Programming with Scratch John Maloney, Kylie Peppler*, Yasmin B. Kafai*, Mitchel Resnick and Natalie Rusk MIT Media Laboratory 77 Massachusetts Ave. E15-020 Cambridge, MA 02139 001-617-253-6879 *UCLA Graduate School of Education 2331 Moore Hall Los Angeles, CA 90095-1521 001-310-206-8150 [jmaloney, mres, nrusk]@media.mit.edu ABSTRACT This paper describes Scratch, a visual, block-based programming language designed to facilitate media manipulation for novice programmers. We report on the Scratch programming experiences of urban youth ages 8-18 at a Computer Clubhouse ”an after school center ”over an 18-month period. Our analyses of 536 Scratch projects collected during this time documents the learning of key programming concepts even in the absence of instructional interventions or experienced mentors. We discuss the motivations of urban youth who choose to program in Scratch rather than using one of the many other software packages available to them and the implications for introducing programming at after school settings in underserved communities. kpeppler@ucla.edu, kafai@gseis.ucla.edu documented activities where computer-programming opportunities are available outside of the school space for precollege youth. Summer camps, after-school programs, and community technology centers could play a greater role in offering opportunities for learning computer programming. For one, most schools use TI - Programming by choice: urban youth learning programming with scratch DO - 10.1145/1352135.1352260 DA - 2008-03-12 UR - https://www.deepdyve.com/lp/association-for-computing-machinery/programming-by-choice-urban-youth-learning-programming-with-scratch-M3S1CllFpz DP - DeepDyve ER -