Start From Scratch

🎯 What you'll learn

By the end of this lesson you'll have a free Scratch account, know what every part of the screen does, and have made your very first sprite move!

📋 Step 1 — Create your account

🗺️ Step 2 — Learn the screen

The Scratch editor has four main areas:

• Block palette (left) — all your colourful code blocks, sorted by category
• Scripts area (middle) — drag blocks here to build your code
• Stage (top right) — the area where your project runs live
• Sprite list (bottom right) — shows all your characters and objects

🏃 Step 3 — Make your first sprite move

🎯 What you'll learn

Motion blocks are blue. They control where your sprite moves, which direction it faces, and how it gets around the stage.

⭐ The most useful Motion blocks

• Move 10 steps — moves forward in whichever direction the sprite is facing
• Turn ↻ 15 degrees — rotates clockwise. Use Turn ↺ to go anti-clockwise
• Go to x: 0 y: 0 — teleports to exact coordinates. Centre of stage = x:0, y:0
• Glide 1 secs to x: y: — smoothly slides to a position over time
• If on edge, bounce — makes the sprite turn around at the edge of the screen
• Point in direction 90 — 90=right, -90=left, 0=up, 180=down

🏃 Activity — Bouncing sprite

🎯 What you'll learn

Looks blocks are purple. They control how your sprite appears — what it says, what it wears, how big it is, and any special effects.

⭐ Key Looks blocks

• Say "Hello!" for 2 secs — shows a speech bubble for a set time, then disappears
• Think "Hmm..." for 2 secs — shows a thought bubble (the cloudy kind!)
• Switch costume to [name] — changes the sprite's outfit
• Next costume — switches to the next costume automatically
• Set size to 100% — changes how big the sprite appears
• Set [colour] effect to 50 — adds visual effects like colour changes or ghosting

🎭 Activity — Walking animated cat

🎯 What you'll learn

Sound blocks let you play sounds, record your own voice, and build music into your projects. They make everything feel much more alive!

⭐ Key Sound blocks

• Play sound [Meow] until done — plays a sound and waits for it to finish before moving on
• Start sound [Meow] — plays a sound but immediately moves to the next block
• Stop all sounds — silences everything
• Set volume to 100% — controls how loud sounds are
• Change pitch effect by 10 — makes sounds higher or lower

🎵 Activity — Keyboard sounds

🎯 What you'll learn

Loops are one of the most important ideas in all of coding! Instead of stacking the same block 100 times, a loop runs the code inside it over and over automatically.

⭐ The three loop blocks

• Forever — runs the blocks inside non-stop until you press the red stop button
• Repeat 10 — runs the blocks inside exactly 10 times (you can change the number)
• Repeat until <> — keeps looping until a condition becomes true

🌀 Activity — Draw a shape with loops

🎯 What you'll learn

If/Then logic lets your code make decisions. "IF this thing is true, THEN do this." Without it, your project just runs the same way every time no matter what.

⭐ The if blocks

• If <> then — runs the code inside only if the condition is true
• If <> then / else — runs one set of blocks if true, a different set if false
• Touching [mouse pointer]? — detects if a sprite is touching something
• Key [space] pressed? — detects keyboard input inside an if

🎮 Activity — Colour change on touch

🎯 What you'll learn

A variable is like a labelled box that stores a number or word. The value can change while your project runs. You need variables for scores, lives, timers — basically every real game uses them!

📦 Creating a variable

⭐ Key variable blocks

• Set [Score] to 0 — sets it to an exact value (use at the start to reset)
• Change [Score] by 1 — adds 1 to the current value
• Show / Hide variable [Score] — controls whether the counter appears on screen

🏆 Activity — Score and lives counter

🎯 What you'll learn

Broadcasting is like sending a radio signal — one sprite shouts a message, and any sprite that's "listening" reacts to it. This is how you get multiple sprites to coordinate and create proper scenes.

📡 The broadcast blocks

• Broadcast [message1] — sends a message to all sprites and moves on immediately
• Broadcast [message1] and wait — sends a message and waits for all receivers to finish
• When I receive [message1] — placed on the receiving sprite; runs its blocks when the message arrives

🎬 Activity — Two-sprite conversation

🎯 What you'll learn

A variable holds one thing at a time. A list holds many things — like a shopping list. Each item has a position number. The first item is position 1, the second is position 2, and so on.

📋 Creating a list

⭐ Key list blocks

• Add [thing] to [Questions] — adds a new item to the end of the list
• Item 1 of [Questions] — retrieves the item at position 1
• Length of [Questions] — tells you how many items are in the list
• Delete all of [Questions] — empties the whole list

❓ Activity — Quiz game