Code Word: Programming
I’m feeling a little sneaky using Hour of Code this week: do my students know they are building logic skills? Do they know they are in a competency-based learning environment? Do they have the rush of adrenaline when they finally get it right at the end? I’m sure I do.
Hour of Code is part of a week to promote computer science in schools. The premise is to get students programming. Why programming? I’m going to stick with the logic of it. IF…THEN from my BASIC days. Or maybe that was FORTRAN. I learned both in high school. Do remember them? No, not really. In fact, there’s a third language we had a class for and I don’t remember. COBALT? C++? Regardless, it was a hands-on class with immediate results: if it worked, it worked. If it didn’t, you figured it out.
This is a skill all of our students need: figuring out why something doesn’t work. Asking questions, trying again and again and again…not giving up, not surrendering to the idea that failure is a bad thing. (It is, but only if you stop there.)
Here’s my Hour+ of Code product. I love learning alongside my students.
My creation. I worked for it!
