Coding is an important skill that our students should be able to learn from an early age. There are now several free web tools and mobile apps to help teachers introduce coding to students and to also dispel the myth that coding is done only by a narrow sub category of people with special mathematical and technology background. Coding isn’t just for computer whizzes, says Mitch Resnick of MIT Media Lab — it’s for everyone. In a fun, demo-filled talk Resnick outlines the benefits of teaching kids to code, so they can do more than just “read” new technologies — but also create them.
I particularly loved the analogy Mitch made to reading and writing:
When kids learn to code , it enables them to learn many other things, opens up many new opportunities for learning. It’s useful to make an analogy to reading and writing, when you learn to read and write it opens up opportunities for you to learn so many other things, when you learn to read you can then read to learn, which is the same thing with coding, if you learn to code you can code to learn.
Watching this wonderful TED talk together with the ” what schools don’t teach” I come out with the following ideas :
- Coding teachers kids several skills that are also relevant for all sort of other activities:
- It helps kids learn in meaningful context
- It teaches them that learning is a process and not a product
- It teaches them how to take complex ideas and break them down into simpler parts
- It teaches them how to collaborate with others
- It also teaches them how to keep persistent and persevere in the face of frustration when things are not working well
- it teaches determination and risk-taking
- It helps them become fluent with technologies and enable them to open open up and express their ideas.
- It helps them be creative
- It helps them interact with the world around them
1- Lets teach kids to code
2- What schools do not teach
