Although she works at Microsoft, Islander Middle School parent Jane Bove was quick to admit that she’s not a coder. At least that’s what she said when she met Code.org CEO and co-founder Hadi Partovi at the Grace Hopper conference in October. Partovi spoke about Hour of Code, a global movement that aims to encourage people to learn computer science.
“The first thing that I said was, ‘I really want to help with Hour of Code, but I don’t code,’” she relayed. “He directed me to the Hour of Code website because you don’t need to be a coder to do it, and it was very true. But it was me getting over the hurdle of going in and trying it.”
Last week, Bove aimed to help students at Islander Middle School get over that very hurdle. Bove partnered with IMS teachers Ellis Reyes and Becky Mullvain, leading workshops before and after school last Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday.
This was the third year IMS hosted an Hour of Code event. Reyes, who teaches technology and is a member of the district’s Technology Advisory Group, said 246 students turned in a module, or roughly one-fifth of the school.
“We have kids who are coding from the most basic levels, using block-based coding levels all the way up to writing code in formal languages like Python, C++ and C#,” he said. “They’re making little things happen onscreen to doing complete games and animations onscreen using those variety of languages.”
Though typically an Hour of Code event lasts for one hour, Bove said spreading the workshops over three days was an attempt to introduce coding to as many students as possible.
Sixth-grader Derek D’Souza has been coding since he was in second grade, and said he’s tried Scratch, Java and Python coding languages.
“It can be easy in certain cases, it’s really fun,” he said.
IMS parent Amy Sun brought both her 6th grade son Connor and 3rd grade daughter Abigail to the first workshop Monday morning. She said she brought her daughter in particular to get excited about coding and to not fear a field that is largely occupied by men. Code.org lists ways to recruit girls to computer science, stating, “Computer science is foundational to many fields, but not enough girls are choosing to study it.”
“I think a lot of girls are intimidated by it,” Sun said. “I know this entices kids because it’s game-related. As they get older, the product is not as fun and not as interesting to a girl. I hope [teachers] realize when teaching code, to use something enticing to both boys and girls.”
For Bove, it was eye-opening to see how common coding really was as a world-wide language. And in a world becoming increasingly digital, the importance of learning to code couldn’t be more clear.
“You absolutely have to introduce it in a way that’s familiar and comfortable,” Bove said. “All we want to do is introduce as many people to it in a way that doesn’t cost them a fortune. It’s easy to try, it’s one hour, everything is pre-packaged and pre-planned, and now, I’m not scared anymore.”
