Coding For Dummies

Hey Gang,

For this post our class was tasked with diving into Coding. This is a foreign concept to me. I remember a WAY back in elementary school we were introduced to HTML, but nothing quite like this. Below is my adventure through Coding using the website Hour of Code. This site is a life saver! It literally walks you through Coding at numerous grade levels and topics. And by walks you through, I literally mean walks. At the lower grade levels (I chose grade 2) it takes you step by step through the foundation steps of Coding and progresses you through at a reasonable pace. See the below pictures for my Coding game.

I started by choosing The Grinch Game.

The first few steps were very straight forward and quiet honestly, hard to screw up

The steps then start to compound.

As you move from step to step the game lets you know if you were successful….

Or if you made a mistake

Each step gets progressively harder and more complex.

‘If’ statements are soon introduced to add to the complexity.

And then, of course, you are required to add multiple ‘If’ statements. Again, adding to the complexity.

And finally, after working logically through 20 stages; I have completed the Grinch Coding Game. As the title of the website states, it did take me approximately 1 hour. However, it sure didn’t feel like an hour. The game was interactive and fun. I found that because I understood the original story of The Grinch it made the coding process easier. If you are going to use this website for coding practice (and I would recommend you do), I suggest picking a game topic that is of interest to you. This may sound obvious but as our class was introduced to this site we looked at the Star Wars game and I was lost. The Star Wars and the The Grinch game actually follow the same format, only they have different characters (obviously). I guess having some background knowledge made me more comfortable and less overwhelmed.

The website is even nice enough to offer a wonderful certificate upon completion!

I certainly learned  a lot form this undertaking. Coding, while initially intimidating, is quite the opposite. Websites like Code Academy, Scratch and Hour of Code have unique ways of introducing Coding to even the biggest of dummies (like yours truly) and making it easy. As for its place in an educational setting. I will defer to a later date on that. While I have no doubt that there is a large need for knowledge of this topic in schools and business; I feel as if I do not know enough about the true power of Coding to be able to give a solid opinion. So please consider me firmly on the fence.

 

Cheers,

BDA