By Joseph Varghese
Staff Reporter
A team of researchers, faculty and students from Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar (CMUQ) recently introduced Alice Middle East, a 3D interactive educational animation software.
The software aims to help primary and secondary school students learn the basics of computer programming and how to apply logical thinking and problem-solving techniques.
The software is being used presently at three schools in Qatar and the researchers hope that it will be used in many more schools in the country and the region soon.
Alice helps students in learning fundamental programming concepts by developing animated movies and simple games. In Alice, 3D objects representing people, animals and vehicles populate a virtual world and students create a programme to animate these objects.
The programme is a localised version of the Alice that was developed by the late Randy Pausch and her team at the main campus of the Carnegie Mellon University in the US. The programme is widely used in America, Asia and Europe with an estimated 1.4mn downloads per year.
Alice Middle East was first implemented in Al Arqam Academy in Doha on a pilot phase, running for one semester. It is now followed in the seventh, eighth and ninth grades of the school.
The Supreme Education Council later rolled out the programme for grade 8 students in two independent schools. The researchers hope that the successful implementation of the programme in these schools will lead to its adoption as part of the curriculum for grade 8 in all the schools in the country.
Saquib Razak, an assistant professor of computer science at CMUQ along with Yonina Cooper, a retired associate professor from CMUQ, worked out the modalities of developing the local version of the programme.
“Computer scientists will be at the forefront of Qatar’s development of a knowledge-based economy, making computational thinking an essential skill that all the students should have an opportunity to learn,” said Razak.
The logo of Alice Middle East
