Hi my friends!

Yesterday I was attending a really cool presentation that wasn’t about the same topics… The topic was something actual, something real, and yes, something in the future…

The topic of this presentation was on kids and code and how can we enable the actual kids to learn not only to program, but also to have fun and learn new skills that may become really useful for them in the near future!

Fun and Learn

When I was at school some years ago (can’t remember how many now!) we used to have a computer science class where we learnt to use and develop some programs or graphical solutions using Basic, Logo (the epic turtle!!!) or even Pascal. I was maybe 8 or 10 when we did this, but I remember that this was very useful when starting my first year of Computer Science. When we started to learn how to program, we started by using Pascal to then go to C.

But back from the past to our kids now. What if the actual kids can start to play with all the technology they have available? What if they can have fun while they learn? Well, this is what it is all about! :)

Kids can start from even 4 years to grow their skills and knowledge in programming or computer science. It does not matter if they will use this for a job in the future or not, the important part of this learning process is that they will learn while having fun and these skills may increase their curiosity and their skills.

There are different initiatives around the world, where parents or mentors can help to teach the kids how to code or how to use devices like Raspberry Pi or Arduino.

Technologies

These are some of the technologies that kids can start to use:

• Scratch
• HTML
• Raspberry Pi
• Python
• Node.js
• Arduino

The presentation I attended was about enabling kids to learn to code and have fun and presenting also the possibility to use a platform like Bluemix to build and deploy their projects. This is really cool.

I also got to know some useful resources that you may find useful for you or your kids!

CoderDojo

http://hourofcode.com

IBM Academy of Technology YouTube channel

This is an example of CoderDojo activities for kids hoping that you will enjoy it!

Kids can now go from developing and building applications on their Raspberry Pi or Arduino, to deploy applications using a PaaS platform like Bluemix where they can use a wide variety of technology like NodeRed or Internet of Things Foundation to build the new great app they have in their mind.

Kids have the future in their hands

Kids have the power and the key for the future. We used to play with Lego to build houses or cars. Now kids can play with code to build the world!

Before…

Now…