Technical Help 2019-11-26T15:08:04+00:00

Technical Help

Help with Opening MouseWizard Masters’ Files

MouseWizard Masters work folders are emailed home at the end of each term.

Picture files in JPEG or BMP format can be opened with any software that you use for viewing photographs, but you may require help to view animations in SWF or GIF formats. Scratch files in SB3 format will need appropriate software to view.  Firstly find out the type of format by resting the cursor on the mystery file.  A caption will appear with the information.

teaching children computer mouse skills

SWF Animation Files

To open in Windows OS:

Right click on the file.  Select ‘Open with…’ & check ‘Select program from a list’ 

Select Internet Explorer which will probably be the recommended program anyway.  You will need to ‘Allow blocked content’.

To open in Mac OS:

You will need to download an app, Elmedia Player.  You can use this link https://mac.eltima.com/media-player.html

To start the animation or game you will need to click on the page.  Once you do this the arrows will respond.

GIF Files

GIF files are also animations.

Right click on the file, select ‘Open with…’ & choose Windows Media Player or QuickTime. 

Play the animation by clicking on the play button.

SB3 Scratch Files

There are two ways to open a Scratch file.

Download the Scratch app from https://scratch.mit.edu/download  This will download the offline version. Open it and in ‘File’ select ‘Load from my computer’, then navigate to your child’s own file.

To avoid having to download the app you can open Scratch online from https://scratch.mit.edu/

Click on ‘Start Creating’, close the green window and use ‘File’ to open your child’s work as described above.

Scratch is a programming language.  It uses code to create animations and interactive stories.  You can find out more about Scratch from their website. 

Scratch activities are popular, so it might be something your child would like to spend more time on.  They could use the work they have already produced as a starting point for further exploration.