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6 great coding websites and apps for tweens and teens

6 great coding websites and apps for tweens and teens
My daughter's school offered a coding class as one of this year's summer school offerings. I was excited. She was not. Ah, tweens. I appreciate the kid's style, and after taking a few other factors into consideration, we talked about how she was going to have to take initiative, stay motivated and all those things that often don't come easily to this age group. At my request, over these first few weeks of summer my tween tried out an assortment of coding websites and apps for tweens and teens. 1. Cost: Free Best for Kids in Grades 6-12 What my tween thought: She was a little thrown at first that it jumps right in and teaches by example, telling kids to start altering some code already entered to see what happens, and not really explaining much. At first, though, she wrote down "little boring" but crossed that off and next to it wrote "Awesome!" What an expert thinks: "Code Monster is simple but mostly effective as a self-led journey of programming discovery. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. Cost: $3.99

How young is too young to teach coding in schools? This week Federal Education Minister Christopher Pyne initiated a push to put maths or science on the agenda of all Australian year 11 and 12 students. The move comes as our standard in international testing has slumped over the last decade. Likewise, this month Opposition leader Bill Shorten targeted the primary school curriculum saying that a Labor government would work to ensure that all primary and secondary school students received digital literacy and computer coding education. Importantly, this would be from a teacher who has had the opportunity to receive training in coding themselves. While from opposite sides of the fence, both bids signal a need for change in the way we educate our youngest generation. I believe a seismic ‘education’ shift has been on the cards for a while and that immediate action is required to ensure that the technology / entrepreneur-fuelled spark is ignited in our youngest and brightest. So how do we implement this change? 1. 2. 4. 5. 6.

ICT in Primary Education: Transforming children's learning across the curriculum - University of London About the Course Teachers and policymakers working in all sectors of education now recognise the importance and value of technology for learning and teaching. The UCL Institute of Education, University of London (IOE and the UNESCO Institute for IT in Education (IITE ) are collaborating to run this professional development course for teachers, headteachers and policymakers working in the Primary Education sector. The course is part of IITE’s role to support and promote an active community of practitioners and policymakers in the use of digital technologies for learning and teaching. It is also linked to the IOE’s mission to promote excellence in education and professional practice through advancing knowledge and understanding. The resources for the course are derived from teachers’ Primary practice in different countries. Announcement for US based teachers: Course Syllabus Learning Outcomes The intended learning outcomes are: Instructors Advisors

Ready to Learn Coding? Here are resources. Plus: Teaching with Scratch| The Maker Issue There are several ways to start learning about code, and each offers something a little different. Not all coding sites are created equal, and not every site or initiative works for every teacher or learner. A playful, introductory experience might not satisfy a teacher looking for a civic-minded coding experience, while an in-depth tutorial on programming games might not be the best starting place for a kid interested in web design. For novices, there are many ways to enter the coding ecosystem. Online coding lessons <Here’s Where to go/> Several sites offer free, online, self-paced lessons to help you learn text-based code—coding in the raw, so to speak. It’s very common to learn to code by looking at working code and figuring out how and why it works. Although the quality of lessons can be inconsistent, messing around on Codecademy or a similar site is an inexpensive way to learn the basics of programming, and how universal concepts transfer. Starting from Scratch Physical computing

Coding For Kids - Five Options for K-8 Students - More Than A Tech Access to affordable technology is driving a revolution in how teachers teach and students learn. One of the trends in recent years is teaching computer programming to younger students, i.e. coding for kids. It can be fascinating to see how younger students interact with laptops, tablets and cell phones. Sites like the ones below take a block approach to programming. Codecademy ( Codecademy is easily the most popular website that teaches anyone programming with the help of a user-friendly interface and a wide variety of coding languages to learn. Scratch ( This site was designed and maintained by MIT students. The Foos ( Learning can be so much fun with the Foos. Lightbot ( Lightbot is great fun for kids and does a really good job by introducing some complex principles of programming. CheckIO ( is a unique way to learn coding. Did we miss one?

About An overview of Kodu. (Click to play) Kodu lets kids create games on the PC and Xbox via a simple visual programming language. Since Kodu's introduction in 2009, we have visited the White House, teamed up with great groups like NCWIT and DigiGirlz, inspired academic research and been the subject of a book (Kodu for Kids). Kodu for the PC is available to download for free.

untitled The game machine W2L Info Published on December 1st, 2013 | by What2Learn Are you looking to make your own study game? No technical skills or programming knowledge is required to make these fun and effective study games – simply fill in the blanks with your own questions and answers and your flash-based game is instantly created and available for your students to play online. If you would like to create some games in the meantime, please sign up for a great value student or teacher Premium Account. Take a look below at the fantastic games you could soon be making… Hangman-style study games Simply provide eight single word answers to make your game. Q & A quizzes Provide eight questions and answers. Anagram study games Provide eight questions and answers. Matching activities Interactive wordsearches Provide eight questions and answers. Ready to make your own study games? Click the ‘sign up’ link at the top of this page if you are ready to start creating your own study games like the ones above. Related posts:

Design an App! A Digital Technologies Project for 4/5/6 In this ICT activity, students create their own app. The project is accessed through a Weebly. It is open-ended and caters for the diversity of all students. It is student-paced, allowing students to work through it at their own speed. Upon completion of the project, students present their new app to the class. Year 5 English: Digitial Technologies – Year 5/6: 6.5 Design a user interface for a digital system, generating and considering alternative designs.6.6 Design, modify and follow simple algorithms represented diagrammatically and in English involving sequences of steps, branching, and iteration (repetition).6.9 Manage the creation and communication of ideas and information including online collaborative projects, applying agreed ethical, social and technical protocols. Task Overview: Your task is to design your very own app that can be used on iPads or iPhones. Activity 1 – Time To User Your Imagination! Think very creatively about the type of app that you would like to make.

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