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About This Activity

Pair with Base Project

Activity Guide

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pkrp-about

In this programming activity, learners will build an interactive Scratch program to present information and stories about te iwa o Matariki, the nine stars of Matariki, in an interactive presentation.

Learners will draw on skills in research, digital technologies, literacy, and oratory to create their virtual display boards. They can work independently or in teams to investigate the topic, draft reports, arrange images, capture sounds, and code a Scratch program to bring it all together.

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This activity is a Scratch version of Interactive Display Board that offers a way to engage with the project in a fully computerised context, entirely in Scratch, without the need for any Makey Makey hardware or additional craft supplies.

Please use this Matariki-themed extension guide together with the base project activity guide as a framework to support the concepts, goals, and outcomes.

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Assembling sequences of code blocks to animate and loop
Understanding that the order of coded instructions changes outcomes
Identifying and correcting errors

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Using a digital tool to create a purposeful outcome that combines animation and text
Making design decisions to create a meaningful representation
Recognising that a digital product can be shared and experienced by others

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social-sciences

Exploring the cultural significance of Matariki, learning the names of the nine stars, and engaging with the Māori New Year

arts

Design and layout to create an engaging and accurate representation

science

Understanding that the twinkling effect is a creative representation of how stars appear to flicker when viewed from Earth

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Spatial reasoning, positioning star sprites to reflect the actual layout of the Matariki cluster

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Commit to the activity as an intentional unit plan by spreading the workload over multiple sessions, focusing on research, design, programming, construction, and reflection.
Especially for younger leaners, work towards a class project by breaking into nine groups and assigning one star to each. Then guide the class to come together and input their portion of the project into the program until the class has a collaborative final presentation to share and explore together.
Set the size of the star sprites to values that represent their relative brightness (magnitude) of the stars so that they look even more like the cluster. (For reference, you can use the radius values in the Data Table Solutions from the 3D Matariki Star Map activity.)

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Get hands-on crafty to create a physical interactive display board with Makey Makey based on the same topic using the Matariki Extension activity guide.

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Teachers should consider:

Device Preparation as a pre-lesson task, including charging batteries, loading applications, and connecting to the internet.
Group Assignments and logistics, including supporting student collaboration and content focus.

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Take steps to make sure device use is safe, supervised, and purposeful throughout. This activity involves accessing the Scratch coding platform and potentially using the internet for topic research.

General Guidance
- Set clear expectations around safe and purposeful device use at the start of each lesson.
- Support ākonga to know that if they encounter content that feels inappropriate, confusing, or upsetting during their research that they can flag this with kaiako without concern.
- Remind ākonga of your school's digital use agreement before beginning any lesson that involves the internet or a third-party digital platform.
Before the activity
- Consider reviewing and pre-selecting a set of reliable, age-appropriate sources, rather than open internet searching.
- Familiarise yourself with Scratch (scratch.mit.edu) and the settings that control how saved projects are visible publicly to others.
During the activity
- Supervise internet use throughout, circulating actively to monitor and support ākonga.
- Use the FACT framework in the template activity guide as a live tool during research.
- Discuss openly what is and isn't appropriate to include in a Scratch project.
- Encourage ākonga to treat all sources about Matariki, particularly those representing mātauranga Māori, with respect and care as it’s part of a living, culturally significant body of knowledge.