Showing posts with label selling. Show all posts
Showing posts with label selling. Show all posts
Tuesday, March 10, 2015
Killer Apps Eighth Graders Addictive Games Selling Well
A great good news story from http://www.fluency21.com/
Orange Middle School eighth-grader Brian Gorham displays one of
his games, Doodle Shapes, on an iPad. Gorham taught himself how to
write code to create the downloadable game and three others.
(SNP photo by Brett Nuckles)
Youd better, if you want to climb higher in Cloud Jump, a touch-screen video game you can play on your iPhone, iPad or iPod Touch.
The game challenges players answer scientific trivia questions to climb higher and higher into the sky on bouncy clouds. A wrong answer will send you back to the start.
The educational game didnt come from a computer software company -- it was designed single-handedly by Orange Middle School eighth-grader Brian Gorham.
Gorham developed the game for a science class project on weather and precipitation.
While his classmates toiled away on informational posters and PowerPoint presentations, Gorham got out his Mac computer and started coding.
"I thought it would be a fun way to learn about the topic, and it was a lot more fun to make," he said.
Gorham, 13, loves games -- but his on-the-go lifestyle, filled with long bus rides for travel baseball games, made it hard to find the time for them.
He played games on his calculator, but the graphics were simple and the controls clunky. Thats when he decided to take the plunge and learn to make games for his touch-screen iPhone.
The young tech buff wasnt dismayed when he saw that programming classes didnt fit into his budget.
"I thought, Why not just teach myself? " he said.
Gorham programs the games using special software on his laptop computer and collaborates with other game-makers online to perfect the graphics and sound for his games.
Since Cloud Jump, he has gone on to develop and release two new games, which can be purchased and downloaded for 99 cents each in the App Store on any iPhone, iPad or iPod Touch.
In Miner Escape, players take the role of an unlucky miner who must dodge falling icicles in a frozen cave. In Doodle Shapes, players roll from one ascending platform to the next to avoid getting crushed at the top of the screen.
Miner Escape is fun and pretty challenging," said Gorhams classmate, T.J. McCabe, 14. "I could play it all day if I didnt have to stop and go to school."
Christopher Deis, who teaches technology at Orange Middle School, said he is most impressed by his students initiative and inventiveness.
"This is the epitome of self-education," Deis said. "The challenges and concepts that are involved in coding like this are very high-level. Its not something you typically see from a 13-year-old."
Gorhams games already have racked up about 5,000 free downloads, and about 100 more since they went on sale.
He currently is learning more complicated programming languages, and even has plans to port his games to Android smartphones this spring.
For now, he is hard at work on Ice Sled, a high-speed action game featuring a sledding polar bear -- and he said his days as a developer are just getting started.
"Programming can be frustrating, but I think its fun," he said. "Right now I just want to keep learning, improving my skills and making new games."
http://www.fluency21.com/
Sunday, March 1, 2015
Selling your textbook
I hope I didnt catch you too late! Its time for my annual warning to NOT sell your textbook. This is the time of year when many A&P students think about selling their textbook back to the bookstore or textbook co-op. Some sell them directly to other students on campus or through an online platform. DONT DO IT!
Why not? Because you still need it!
Just because your A&P course is over, your use of your A&P textbook is far from over. Here are just a few of the many reasons you should keep your A&P materials, including the textbook:
- Youll need to review your A&P at the start of nearly every topic in your professional / clinical courses. Many nursing, medical, and allied health textbooks include a brief review of A&P . . . but youll do better with a quick skim of your fully illustrated A&P textbook.
- Your A&P textbook will get you out of a jam. There will be occasional moments when you "blank out" on some essential bit of A&P . . . something you need to "get it" in a later course. Your trusty A&P textbook will come to your rescue by providing refreshing your understanding of that tricky concept . . . in a way that is already familiar and comfortable for you.
- You need to start a professional library. So many health professionals begin their careers regretting that they sold off many of the essential reference tools they need to get started in a successful professional career. Your A&P textbook is the core around which you should begin building your professional library of resources.
- When youre out there in the "real world" youll need some tools to help you cope with new situations. Its a great comfort to have your A&P book there to help you review basic concepts that you havent run across in a while. When youre pulled to a different department, start a job in a new specialty, or struggle through a professional continuing education course, youll find your old A&P book is a great place to dig out all those things you know you know . . . but with which you need some brushing up.
I just smile and reply, "you sold off yours after our course ended, didnt you?"
The sheepish reply then comes, "yeah, I know you told us to hold on to it but I didnt think Id really need it. Now I REALLY need it to help me in my nursing course!"
[FYI, we A&P professors really do NOT have a pile of old A&P books laying around to give away.]
Considering that you rarely get much of a return on selling a used textbook, it really isnt much of a hardship to keep your A&P textbook. Youll be really glad that you did!
Also see my Study Tip Your Professional Library in the Lion Den.
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