Beginning with Hour of Code at the Library
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Describes the basics of Hour of Code and gives some ideas of how to use this program in the library.
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Beginning with Hour of Code at the Library
- 1. Hour of Code https://hourofcode.com/us Melendra Sutliff Sanders
- 2. What is it? The Hour of Code is a global movement reaching tens of millions of students in more than 180 countries. An Hour of Code event is any coding event that takes place during Computer Science Education Week: December 7-13, 2015. One-hour tutorials are available in over 40 languages. To have an Hour of Code event, you do not need to know anything about coding. https://hourofcode.com/us/how-to
- 7. Setting It All Up https://code.org/learn
- 9. Go for It! All of this information is in your packets!
Editor's Notes
- I was introduced to the Hour of Code because our Executive Committee president, Eric Benson, asked about it last November. I was able to attend an Hour of Code event in December with my 5 year old daughter and my 10 year old son. Neither of them had any experience coding prior to the event, and they both loved it. Because of that, and the fact that I enjoyed it too, I attended a workshop this summer about the CodeStudio.Org computer science curriculum. NCKLS will be hosting a School Librarians Workshop this summer focused on the curriculum, and I hope after learning more about the Hour of Code, you’ll encourage your local school librarians to attend.
- The Hour of Code is a program sponsored by multiple software and computer coding companies to promote computer science internationally. These companies have created online and offline tutorials and activities to help teach basic coding ideas to children, teens, and adult. Hosting an Hour of Code event is easy, because the website provides all the resources you need. You don’t even need to know anything about coding or computer science before you host your own event! So, if you don’t know anything about coding and computer science, how do you go about planning your own Hour of Code event? Well, start off by going to hour of code how to website: https://hourofcode.com/us/how-to. There you’ll find a how-to video, as well as other advice, and the link to register your program. The benefit of registering your program is that, the Hour of Code organizations will send you posters to promote the event and you’ll get a cool little dot on your town with the name of the library added to the map.
- As you plan your event, you’ll want to try the tutorials: There are many “hour-long” tutorials that you can test out in order to select the one you want to use. The tutorials that are currently on the website are those created last year. These will be available again this year, but there will also be new tutorials soon. Remember that all Hour of Code tutorials: Require minimal prep-time for you; and Are self-guided so that participants can work at their own pace and skill-level Options for tutorials can be found at https://code.org/learn. As it gets closer to the actual Hour of Code week event, there will be more tutorials available, so you might want to check back at the website a week or so before your program to see if there is a new tutorial you want to use. Most of the tutorials are online, so you need to plan your hardware needs. Will you use computers or tablets? Be sure to test tutorials on the devices you select to make sure they work properly (with sound and video). And take time to preview the congratulations page participants will see when they finish. If you don’t have enough devices for each participant to have her own, you have options: Ask participants to pair or team up; have individuals take turns doing online and offline activities; or do a completely offline coding tutorial.
- This is one of the online tutorials. Notice that it has a clear task and some basic directions. As the tutorial continues, more layers are added to the task. The tutorials tell you both when you do it correctly and when you don’t. Although there are many different online tutorials, they all start with the basics and try to get participants to “think” about code as a simplified language.
- If you choose to do an offline event, you can find “live” activities on the Code Studio website. CodeStudio.org has a complete set of coding curriculums. One starting curriculum for early readers, one for starting curriculum for people who can already read, and one second level course. Within each curriculum, there are individual coding tutorials that build on each other. These unplugged activities are perfect for an offline hour of code event. Simply select one of the unplugged activities near the beginning of a curriculum and download the lesson plan for specifics, materials, and even a time-line for teaching the lesson. Each lesson also comes with a short explanatory video that you can show students, or that you can watch yourself for ideas on how to explain a concept. All of these materials are free, and if students enjoy the event, you could easily turn this into a weekly club using the curriculums. In your Hour of Code packets, I’ve included a sample offline tutorial. Many of the offline activities include projects that could be made into games as well.
- The offline activities are laid-out as lesson plans, and therefore, they provide some things the online tutorials do not. Such as vocabulary and wrap-up. We won’t run through an entire offline tutorial now, but I do want you to get the flavor for how they work. We’re going to do an activity from one of the early lesson plans.
- After you select your online or offline tutorials, you’ll need to set up your space. It’s a good idea to bookmark the URL for the tutorial you selected on all the devices you plan to use, or have the site up on the computers before letting the participants at them. I also recommend having enough space around each device that a parent or partner can help each child as they navigate the tutorial. If you’re doing an offline activity, be sure to have all the necessary materials and copies of directions for everyone. If you want to hand out certificates at the end, without having to print them during the event, you can print them off in advance and write in the names of participants as they finish their tutorials.
- After you choose your tutorial and get your equipment set up, the last step is figuring out how to actually start the program. Hour of Code suggests beginning your event with some inspiration. They provide a number of inspirational videos on their website. Here’s a mid-length video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nKIu9yen5nc After the video, it’s a good idea to provide a short introduction to computer science. Discuss it in a simple way that includes examples of applications that both boys and girls will care about: Talk about things like, how 3D printing is being used to create limbs for amputees or microchips are used to find lost pets. Explain that learning computer science is more than learning to code in a computer language, it's about learning how computers and software are changing everything in our world, from digital animation in movies to mobile banking. This means that it's important to learn more about how technology works regardless of what career they want to go into, as computer science if being used even in careers like farming where data is used for watering and fertilizing, fashion where programmable LED clothing is hitting runways, and medicine where robots are being used for surgery.
- That’s it! It’s super easy and fun. It also provides a great opportunity for partnerships in your community, as many schools and even community colleges, colleges, and universities are taking an interest in Hour of Code. I hope that each of you will host and hour of code event at your library this year!