26th November 2019

Announcing the winners of the CoderDojo Boo Challenge!

Throughout October and early November we ran a competition for CoderDojo Ninjas — The CoderDojo Boo Challenge! Young people made projects that incorporated either bats, orange, or October. Check out some of the amazing coded creations below!

Who took part?

We received a spook-tacular 252 project entries from young people across 17 different countries. The majority of projects were built using Scratch, but we also received projects created with Python, HTML, C++ and more.

With so many awesome projects, it was very tricky for our judges to select winners. The projects below really impressed the judges for their originality, creativity, technical skill…and of course spookiness! 

7–11 year old age category

3rd prize: Rhys, who attends Cobh Dojo in Ireland, scoops third prize for his quick-fire pumpkin and bat Scratch game. Why not have a go at Rhys’ awesome game!

 

2nd prize: In second place is Emily with her addictive ping-pong game, “Spooky Bounce.” She developed the project at Upper Deeside Dojo in Scotland. See if you can keep the pumpkin off the ground — it’s not easy! Her mum said Emily “had lots of fun spookyfying and improving the bounce game to enter this competition.”

1st prize: First prize goes to Daniel who created a visually stunning project named “Beats vs Zombies” thanks to the skills he learned at the Tramore Dojo in Ireland. The judges commended Daniel’s project for being a very playable game with excellent instructions and quite a lot of code. Speaking about his own project, Daniel said: “I like playing plant v zombies and listening to music and playing the drums, so I thought it would be a good idea to mix them together. It took me about 2-3 weeks to get the game working. I’m so excited at winning, thank you so much.”

11–17 year old age category

3rd prize: Aki Jessica Ewomazino from Nigeria created this fantastic trick-or-treat themed website with well written HTML and advanced use of CSS. The “treat” page of the website outlines the independence days of four countries which took place in October — what a clever way to use the competition’s October theme!

2nd prize: In second place is Thijs van der Heijden from the Netherlands. Thijs’ project uses a Micro:bit, Super:bit, DFPlayer, LED string and an Ultrasoon Sensor to bring a terrifying pumpkin to life! You can also check out the code that Thijs used in his project.

1st prize: First prize goes to Daniel Pickford from the UK for his tile-based game “Halloween Haunting.” The judges had lots of fun playing this high-pressure chase game, as evident from the quotes below:

Wow, a lot of code in this game, which was quite playable, but hard too. Liked the sounds and spooky feel. This one really stood out. You don’t often see sprites chasing each other or disappearing if they’re spotted!

Daniel said, “I had a great time creating the game and sharing it with my friends and family.  Although I already knew how to use Scratch, I learnt a great deal, including how to use tilesets, pathfinding and the make a block feature. The game started as a loose concept based upon a Halloween theme that evolved as my skills developed. I came across a number of technical challenges along the way, however I tackled each issue to make the game concept work.”

Congratulations!

Runners-up

A huge well done to the young people below, who have been chosen as runners-up. One of the judges was particularly impressed with Leonardo from Italy’s soccer game:

“I really enjoyed this. Good introduction and instructions. Great sounds and a nice pace to the game! I can see the potential for this game to be developed even further too”

Elliana’s awesome bat robot also grabbed the judge’s attention — check out this video of Elliana explaining her project!

Highly commended

Lastly, there were some projects additional projects that really stood out for our judges. Among these was a project which explored the significance of October, a spooky graveyard animation, a Micro:bit powered foam ghost with sound effects, and a dancing skeleton!

 

Thank you to everyone who took part

The CoderDojo Foundation team was blown away by the creativity, teamwork, and above all the FUN on display from participants! We hope that you all enjoyed the competition as much as we did, and we look forward to seeing what the Ninjas create again next time!

Want to make sure you hear about our next competition? You can sign up to our monthly volunteers newsletter at: http://dojo.soy/newsletter

 

 

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