This morning, The Dude and I hung out at another fantastic workshop by Code For Kids. Again held at the Shopify office downtown, this time the Shopify staff had their hands full running two back-to-back sessions for kids aged 7-12.
While last time the workshop introduced kids to the game-building app Scratch, today the kids had an opportunity to learn basic HTML and CSS tags, and build their own site on Code-by-Kids.com.
Each kid was equipped with a laptop and a set of paper tags to do some prototyping. They learned tiny bits of code and then tried their hands at coding their pages, and then learned a bit more. They even had paper HTML tags and drawing paper so they could mock up their sites and try their hands at paper prototyping. (An early introduction to user experience, WIN!)
By the end of the session, the kids had FTP-ed the files to the servers a few times over, and left with the requisite files and tools on a USB key so they could continue working on their sites at home.
I talked to some of the kids during the workshop to find out how it was going. The comments ranged from "good" to "awesome" (as they usually do) but I'm happy to declare that no one was "bored" - LOL. Most of them were new to development, and they were really interested in trying to develop sites at home. One of them even said, "My mom builds sites so she can help me." (And no, that wasn't the Dude ;)
Based on the feedback and the smiling faces at the end of the 3 hours, I'd call this another rousing success. If you're curious, they're live streaming the afternoon session.
[Aside: If you haven't checked them out, I encourage you to head over to http://code-for-kids.com and sign up to the mailing list to stay up to date on future events.]
While last time the workshop introduced kids to the game-building app Scratch, today the kids had an opportunity to learn basic HTML and CSS tags, and build their own site on Code-by-Kids.com.
Each kid was equipped with a laptop and a set of paper tags to do some prototyping. They learned tiny bits of code and then tried their hands at coding their pages, and then learned a bit more. They even had paper HTML tags and drawing paper so they could mock up their sites and try their hands at paper prototyping. (An early introduction to user experience, WIN!)
By the end of the session, the kids had FTP-ed the files to the servers a few times over, and left with the requisite files and tools on a USB key so they could continue working on their sites at home.
I talked to some of the kids during the workshop to find out how it was going. The comments ranged from "good" to "awesome" (as they usually do) but I'm happy to declare that no one was "bored" - LOL. Most of them were new to development, and they were really interested in trying to develop sites at home. One of them even said, "My mom builds sites so she can help me." (And no, that wasn't the Dude ;)
Based on the feedback and the smiling faces at the end of the 3 hours, I'd call this another rousing success. If you're curious, they're live streaming the afternoon session.
[Aside: If you haven't checked them out, I encourage you to head over to http://code-for-kids.com and sign up to the mailing list to stay up to date on future events.]
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| Julien kicks things off |
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| The kids trying out their hands at coding |
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| Paper protyping |