CODING FOR KIDS

What is computer coding

Back in the 1940s, while he was also otherwise occupied helping The Allies win the Second World War, an Englishman by the name of Alan Turing had, what was at the time, a revolutionary idea about how machines might work in the future. Until Mr. Turing cam along a machine was designed, built and used to serve one purpose only. Turing’s revolutionary idea was to build machines that could be programmed and programmed again and again to do all manner of different tasks. At the time the name given to workers whose primary function was the repeated application of calculations or processes to produce high volumes of outputs was a “computer”. Turing’s groundbreaking paper, “”On Computable Numbers..” derived some context from these computers and it is from this origin we get the term computer programming, or as the cool kids call it, computer coding.

In the simplest of terms, when asked what is computer coding, it can be described as writing instructions in the language used by a computer so we can talk to it and ask it to do things. Computer Code is similar to any other language in that it is based on a set of rules that are applied using everyday letters and a few other symbols to create instructions that can be recognised by the computer. The “code” can be thought of as words”, “coding” can be thought of like writing, and a “computer program” is like an instruction manual.

Computer programming aka coding for kids

At Coding for Kids we’ve gone to a lot of effort to ensure that we teach our students a skill that is not only easy to learn but also very useful. With such a variety of options available, our experienced trainers have spent considerable time developing computer classes for kids using a programming language that we are sure will make it easy for almost all children to learn to code, and ensure that computer coding for kids is something they’ll be able to continue to develop.

Just like the many languages people have developed and use to communicate with each other, there have been a fair number of computer programming languages that have been developed in the last 60 years. Whether it be due to technological advances such as those which will require new ways to talk to Quantum Computers when they are developed, or simply because a group of people thought they could do better, a large number of programming languages have come, and gone over the years.

In the early days of computing, a programming language was little more than a series of perforations in a card. Fast forward to the 1960s and with the birth and subsequent explosion of personal computing we also saw a similar surge in the development of programming languages such as BASIC (Beginner’s All-purpose Symbolic Instruction Code) that could be used on these new “Personal Computers”.

Fast forward another 20 years or so and we saw a group of software engineers get together with the idealistic goal to develop a programming language that was not only very well designed and highly versatile, but most importantly FREE for anyone to use however they wanted. This concept of making a programming language free to all is called open-source and the open-source software developed by these hopeful software engineers is known as Linux.

Linux has been so successful since its inception it is still one of the most popular programming languages used today. In fact roughly 80% of all Android (ie non iPhone) smartphones used today utilise an operating system (funnily enough call Android) which is based on the Linux programming language. And while there are many many other programming languages used widely today, such as HTML which is used to build websites, we at Coding for Kids strongly believe that Linux is not only the best place to start learning to code but most importantly will provide our students with expertise in a programming language that they could one day use to develop software to run millions and millions of smartphones around the world.

Computer programming simplified with our computer classes for kids

At Coding for Kids one of our primary aims through the development of our computer classes for kids was to make them accessible and easy. Most families these days have a laptop computer but not all do. And those that do have laptops may have devices that run on different operating systems to the laptop used by the next family. Other courses overcome this issue by supplying computers for their students to used by what happens when those students go home? Our solution was to provide every single student with their very own computer to both learn to code on but also take home with them to continue their computer programming journey outside the classroom.

The computer that we decided to supply to every student is called the Raspberry Pi. While the Raspberry Pi is only the size of a small smartphone it is a fully functional computer that is capable of doing almost anything most home computers can do. And to ensure every student is set and ready to go from the very first moment they walk into the classroom, each Raspberry Pi is already preloaded with the most widely used Linux based Operating System called Raspbian. Coding for Kids has used our extensive software experience to provide all our students with the easiest way to get up and coding within minutes.