While I understand the limitations of Scratch, and can see the potential for frustration with the program, I had a lot of fun working with Scratch both in class and outside of it for my project! Having no previous experience in coding whatsoever, using the program Scratch offered such a low barrier to entry for creative coding for me. Using the pieces (which really resemble Legos!) made the basic functionalities really easy to achieve. Other movements and functionalities might be harder to achieve, but looking through the community and their projects on Scratch, and even being able to copy their code blocks would make that easier. The best part was the ability to import your own Sprites. Without this customization, my engagement would have been much lower.
During the process of working with Scratch, I immediately thought about introducing it to children. It's a program designed for children, it's got a child-friendly design, and lends itself to experiments through play. To introduce scratch to children, given the resources (computers or laptops - enough for every child, potentially a scanner, or a mobile phone camera) I would propose a 2-lesson sequence - the first lesson would be a materials exploration of Scratch, using the provided blocks and sprites, so explore what is possible within the program. The second lesson would ask the children to draw a character to use as their own sprite and then scan or photograph this image to upload it to Scratch, and to portray a narrative for their character/Sprite through the the movements and functions of Sprite, looking to community projects to harvest their code if they would like to use it.
I also see the possibility to use Scratch to make an exquisite corpse animation. A class could work one at a time to make a longer animation using one or several sprites, and different directions for them, to make one longer work, which though not cohesive - has the fingerprints of every artist in the class on it.
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