Have cards available for learners, with the boilerplate for the commands on them. Below the boilerplate, have basic descriptions for each of the parameters.

All programming should be group or paired, this is the norm for programmers, remind learners that, generally speaking, programmers work in pairs to write code.

Challenge learners to start chaining commands to accomplish something. Have  them think up tasks to complete: how could you code that? How could you code that more efficiently?

Challenge peers to write code that would end up in the same position as a set pose.

Teacher's Guide - Programming Marty with Python

Presentation for Programming Marty with Python

I can describe the meaning of code in a program and the purpose of parameters in a command.

I can write a command to efficiently carry out an action.

In this lesson, students get more practice with creating and running commands that will move different parts of Marty's body. Students should start to develop an understanding of the outcome of different coding commands on Marty and the environment that he is in. They should also start to gather a better understanding of the Python syntax.

Remind learners that computers take instructions exactly as you write them. There is no understanding or thinking about what you mean, there is only what you write, 'literally', what you write.

Have learners pair up and sit back to back. Have one describe a robot to the other, who will draw it. The drawer cannot ask for more information, the describer cannot turn around and have a look.

Once a drawing is complete, have them switch roles and repeat the exercise. Open it up for a different subject to draw.

Have learners explore Marty fully, in terms of joints and possible movements available. Think back to the drawings the learners just completed and the need for specific instructions.

After learners have had a chance to thoroughly explore the available movement Marty can display, share the ppt presentation, starting with the commands, and stop at slide 13; encourage learners to jot down commands that they think they might want their Marty to display. Draw attention to the parentheses that follow each of the movements Marty might be able to carry out. Sometimes the parentheses are empty and sometimes they are not, ask why this might be by comparing examples: for walk, why might values be important; for hello, why might values not be important? Have learners remember this for future coding exercises.

Have learners click the windows button or open their Mac terminal. In both instances, they should type 'idle'.  Have learners code along from slide 15: load martypy and connect their Marty with the IP address, most easily found by connecting through the app. 

Show the 4 commands and their parameters, in parentheses, from the presentation (slide 17); each time a command is written, for learners to copy, have the template up and describe what each of the parameters means. The commands are:

Encourage learners to take time to experiment with the values within the parentheses: have them use the same command, changing the values and have learners note the effect.

Make the larger Marty library available to learners. Encourage group work, suggesting learners combine commands to see the result or think of how combining different commands could complete a task that one command can't. Ask for volunteers to share any interesting code or code that had been challenging, but the group figured out what it meant.

Bring learners together to share challenges and successes. Ask if anyone grouped a set of commands to perform actions. Did they notice any other similarities to Scratch that they may have seen in prior lessons? Ask learners to think about commands that might be useful to learn for coding Marty. Ask them to think about scenarios that might be useful for a robot like Marty to be used in.

Access to computers/laptops (with Python & MartyPy installed)

Python Student Workbook - Programming Marty with Python

Marty Says Cards

Programming Marty with Python Solutions

Curriculum for Excellence - Technologies: Craft, Design, Engineering and Graphics

Curriculum for Excellence - Technologies: Computing Science

National Curriculum - Computing, Design and Technology: Design and Technology

Curriculum for Excellence - Health and Wellbeing: Relationships

Curriculum for Excellence - Technologies: Technological Developments in Society and Business

CSTA Education Standards

Curriculum for Excellence - Technologies: Digital Literacy

Curriculum for Excellence - Numeracy: Information Handling

Australian Curriculum – Digital Technologies, Design & technologies: Design & Technologies

Curriculum for Excellence - Literacy & English: Listening and Talking

Curriculum for Excellence - Health and Wellbeing: Physical Activity and Sport

Curriculum for Excellence - Health and Wellbeing: Mental, Emotional, Social and Physical Wellbeing

Curriculum for Excellence - Numeracy: Number, Money and Measure

Curriculum for Excellence - Health and Wellbeing: Planning for Choices and Changes

Australian Curriculum – Digital Technologies, Design & technologies: Digital Technologies

National Curriculum - Computing, Design and Technology: Computing

Curriculum for Excellence - Literacy & English: Reading

Curriculum for Excellence - Literacy & English: Writing

International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE)

4.03: Programming Marty with Python

Encourage all learners to illustrate the commands to better remember the code and the resulting action(s). Ensure that each command learners include has an example of the code and a description of what is happening, either short text or diagram.

Learners should think about new commands that should be included in the library but the developers didn't think about, consider the parameters for the command to be carried out effectively and ensure that there is documentation clearly describing the purpose of the command and how it works.

Teacher's Guide - Exploring MartyPy Documentation

Presentation for Exploring MartyPy Documentation

I can describe code in terms of actions, purpose and parameters.

I can describe the usefulness of documentation when users write code.

In this lesson, students will further explore what different movements and functionalities Marty has. Students will start to explore the documentation available for MartyPy.

Ask if learners can recall anything interesting, challenging or funny, from the last lesson. Have them model the different movements they recall Marty making, challenge learners to make the movements  with their own bodies, unless they are unable to do so, in which case have them model it on the available devices.

Remind learners of the importance of specific, unambiguous instructions, when giving them to a computer: remind them of what a person's interpretation means when instructions are given, with the examples of the robot drawings.

Ask learners to recall some of the commands they used in the last lesson when moving Marty through a variety of poses. Then ask if they can remember what each of the parameters, within the parentheses, represented. It may be that they can recall some parts of the commands but not all parts of all the commands. Ask what they think would be good to have, in case programmers forget the exact use or parameters for different commands. 

Introduce 'libraries': in a general sense, ask learners what functions libraries serve for their communities. List the suggestions, the list might include:

they house books and, as a result, facts and knowledge

they have books to explain, to instruct, to help us improve ourselves or encourage us to 'escape'.

Share with learners that programming libraries hold specific information for specific functions to run. A library can hold pre-written code that can be called with a function. Libraries are often imported and the resources that are stored in the library are imported with them: when we set up Marty, last lesson, we did not write the program to make Marty walk;  that was already written, we only had to type the command marty.walk() because the library had already done all of the hard work. 

Have learners think about the number of movements required to have Marty walk one step and think how long it would take a programmer to type that into a program each time they wanted to make Marty walk one or more steps. Have learners explore the other commands from the library and think about the number of individual commands that might exist within the library. 

Introduce 'documentation'. Documentation is what is used to explain what the library holds: 

What am I allowed to enter for each part?

How do I use the command, with all of the appropriate values?

Include images of the command in action, annotating the parts that are affected.

As they go through the documentation, learners should record commands they think will be useful for later use and start to build up a document of their own. Be sure to encourage them to include key parameters and examples, with explanations for what learners will see when the command runs. In addition, encourage groups to think about useful additions they would suggest or try to write, themselves; include these in pseudocode, initially, but include useful information that would clarify  the terms for another user.

Bring learners back together, do a group share, discussing the commands they thought were useful and ones that could  be added: combining movements into one new movement that learners think would be used often enough to warrant being in the library.

Ask about challenges with learning and remembering the commands that are present in the library. 

Encourage learners to think about how they could share this information with a younger year group, or adults. Perhaps they could think about how to design a short workshop with a group class who haven’t used MartyPy yet and get the students to take lead on explaining and teaching others how to use it (with the help of their handbooks of course!) This would be for some future time.

Python Student Workbook - Exploring MartyPy Documentation

Exploring MartyPy Documentation Solutions

4.04: Exploring MartyPy Documentation

Paired programming should continue to be the norm when developing the code so that one is typing while the group is discussing / planning / illustrating the routine; however, having cards with the key commands for a dance routine on each desk should be available to allow each group member the opportunity to be the one typing the commands.

Have learners look to make the code more efficient. By this time, loops and conditionals have not be discussed, for use in Python; have them independently search for how they could be applied. 

Teacher's Guide - Marty Python Dance-Off

Presentation for Marty Python Dance-Off

I can build a short program from known commands. 

I can use documentation to support writing code. 

In this lesson, students will be putting together their first scripts using IDLE so that they can have a list of Python commands to control Marty. From doing this, students will start to build up a dance routine for Marty and have a small danceoff in the class.

Have a few video clips of different dance routines over the years, or use this example, here: 

. Have learners talk together about the different combined movements required for each of the routines. Encourage learners to use their own bodies to emulate one of more of the moves from a dance. It may help to quickly sketch out stick figures and brief captions for the movement.

Given the wide range of movements they may have identified, have learners open their editor for python. Demonstrate the options they have: trying one command at a time in the IDLE window, or any other program for coding; using a text editor, then pasting a sequence of movements into the program. Ask learners which they think is best - there is no correct answer at this point, there are good reasons for programming one line at a time and good reasons for programming entire sequences but you will only see the full dance when it is loaded in its entirety. Testing moves one line at a time in IDLE, or the other program, is a good idea, but saving in a text editor as the program grows, in order to see how moves flow from one to the next, is also worthwhile. Ensure that each step performed is explained as it carried out: copying, pasting, running, saving, editing, etc.

Let learners have free reign to create a routine for Marty. Encourage trial and error throughout the lesson and reassure them that there will be mistakes as they build the routine so the initial focus needs to be on writing code, rather than writing perfect code. Also, have learners comment their code: the # is used, at the start of a line, in python and can be used to describe times where learners overcame a hurdle; were impressed by the code; needed to include an explanation as to what the code was doing; or needed to work on the timing of the move, the distance required for the movement or something else. 

Learners need to write, test, repeat. This will take time for a first attempt at a program so this should be given more time than one lesson.

Once all routines are complete, allow for a dance-off. If some groups finish early, encourage collaboration - have finished groups share insights if other groups are stuck. Additionally, finished groups might get some motivation from visiting other groups and then returning to tweak their work, without copying. Highlight that this is not a race to complete the code. 

For each wrap-up, bring learners together to share successes and challenges. Encourage collaboration so that groups facing challenges share how they overcame any challenges with others.

Python Student Workbook - Marty Python Dance-Off

MartyPy Documentation

Marty Python Dance-Off Solutions

4.05: Marty Python Dance-Off

This lesson pack contains three lessons that involve using Python after getting a feel for it. Learners will have the opportunity to engage in several coding experiences as well as exploring genuine documentation.

Learning Portal

5: Using Python with Marty

Lesson Pack Overview