Amelia Loves to Play and Create Games!

We are proud to highlight Amelia as our newest Featured Maker! She is twelve years old and loves to draw dogs in her own unique way. Amelia is from Washington and when she’s not in school, she loves to draw and play with all her pets. They include a dog, a hamster, and a fish!

When she grows up, Amelia has aspirations of becoming a coder or an artist. She demonstrated her artistic skill when she managed light production in the play 12 Angry Jurors! We had the opportunity to talk to Amelia about her experiences with coding. Read on to learn more about this fantastic Featured Maker!

How did you get introduced to Tynker and how long have you been coding? I’ve been coding for about a year. I got introduced to Tynker through the Minecraft stuff because I’m into Minecraft and I’m always looking for an app to create my own Minecraft resources.

How did you learn how to use Tynker when you were first starting out? I used Space Cadet and Dragon Spells. I really like the dragon one! But I mostly use Minecraft, like the resource editing. I started off by just coloring them in and then I tried out the code. I changed the blob to a dog, then I changed the food and the dog’s costumes. All I did was a costume change, no code editing. Then I did a pet simulator again and it was this dog I created named Snowball. I added more food and toys to give your pet. That got me into coding.

How have your coding skills improved since you started using Tynker? I started off with remixing. Then, I looked into the code of the projects to see how it was and learn from it. I made a project of my own dog and I’m super proud of that project!

How did you feel when you found out your project had been featured? I was excited! When I saw that little reward symbol next to it I said, ‘Oh my gosh, did I win something?!’ I wondered what it was.

What is your favorite project you’ve made so far? ‘Make A Dog’! I’m very proud of that one. I like drawing dogs in that sort of style. They look a little bit like cats, with the small pointy ears. And I like to give the dogs wings and unique things like scars!

‘Make a Dog’

Where did you get the idea for your favorite project and how long did it take you to make? It took me a few days and I got the idea from those games where you create your own dog character. I’ve made a bunch of those!

How do you get inspiration for your projects? I like to play games; I am very into video games and I wanted to create a video game of my own.

Do you have a favorite code block? I usually like the ones like ‘broadcast’ and ‘when I receive’. I’m trying to learn functions, but functions are so hard!

What do you do with a project when you’re done with it? I do some edits. I’ll make a thumbnail for it and I’ll do a really good drawing to grab people’s attention.

What are you planning to make next? I’m working on this wolf simulator game, where you’re a wolf. You start off as a pup and at the end you’re an alpha!

What’s the best thing about Tynker? Getting all the likes. There’s something on the community called shout-outs where other community members give shout-outs to people and say stuff like, ‘I love your art!’ or ‘I love your project!’

How do you think learning to code has prepared you for the future? Learning to code is pretty fun, because I might just be making games of my own.

Do you think other kids should try coding? Yes, because making games is very addicting and fun!

What advice would you give to kids starting out with Tynker? I recommend they try out Minecraft first, and then when they master that feature, they should try courses and coding.

Susan, Amelia’s mom, spoke about how she felt having Amelia learn to code. She told us, “I’m super proud that she’s taken an interest in this. There are platforms like Tynker out there to help a beginner get started and, more importantly, keep her interested.” The community is a positive aspect of Amelia’s experience with Tynker: “It’s really cool that you guys have this community, where she can see what other kids are doing. She can see her own work online and get the likes and feel like she’s accomplished something.”

Susan sees many benefits of Amelia learning to code: “I see coding as a possible career for her. There are so many options with game design or just script coding or web development.” Susan feels that Amelia is also learning key skills like perseverence: “Any kind of achievement where she completes a project that takes a lot of time and effort and sees it through to the end is a good life skill.”

We want to thank Amelia and Susan for taking the time to speak with us about their experience with Tynker! We look forward to seeing more amazing projects from Amelia.