LYNX: Projects for Learning to Code

Learn to:

• create an account

• save your work

• find support materials

• manage your projects

• navigate the Lynx Project Editor

This project will introduce you to Lynx. You will learn about:

• the Command Centre

• the Work area (or page)

• a few Lynx primitives / commands

• some geometry concepts like angles, polygons, the total turtle trip concept (the big 360), and

• the basic foundation of coding: creating your first procedure!

Project 2 starts where Project 1 ended. You are going to:

• make more geometric figures

• work more efficiently

• use this extra power to create geometrical and random art

We will introduce procedures with:

• inputs (variables)

• super and sub-procedures

• random

• forever

• conditional statements

• stop, and

• buttons

Now for something new.

Project 3 introduces clipart (turtle shapes and backgrounds), animation, text boxes, multiple pages and page navigation, buttons and sounds.

You have certainly bought or made a paper birthday card.

• This project:

• shows you how to make a digital Thank You card to send to frontline

• or essential workers. Of course, the same skills can be used to make

• any other type of card: for a birthday or Mother's Day...Ready?

Let’s do something totally different now. No turtles or graphics (unless you want to add some), but lots of fancy text manipulation. Secret codes have been used for ages, even Caesar, two thousand years ago, had his own “recipe” for encrypting messages.

You should know that you can talk to and give commands to the cursor (the flashing bar inside the text box): move the cursor around and have it insert, delete, or change the text as it moves. Let's try this!

The cypher (encoding) in this project is pretty simple, nothing like spies and governments use nowadays, but it is a fun starting point.

The process, for you, will resemble this:

• Create a text box for your message.

• Think (pseudo-code) about a way to “scramble” your text.

• Create a procedure that manipulates the text, in a way that matches your pseudo-code.

• Create a procedure that does the exact opposite to decode the scrambled text.

Many years ago there was a game called Whack-a-mole. Moles appear randomly and very briefly on a board or in an arcade game machine and you have to hit them before they go back underground.

Let’s modify it for the reality of COVID-19. Let's program a video game and call it Kill the Virus. Our game will involve animation, score keeping, and controls (to make the game harder).

Another classic game! In this version of Pong, you will play against the computer.

You will control the paddle, and the ball will bounce on a

wall on the other side of the page.

This advanced project introduces colour detection, collision detection, and mouse interaction.

Let’s start! You are, after all, making a game that your friends can play!

Appendix A - Top 50 Lynx Primitives

Appendix B - Common Coding Errors

Appendix C - Lynx Colour Chart

Appendix D - Finding Things

Appendix E - FAQ

Appendix F - Sharing