Grades 2-6. 1-day workshops, or 1 to 2 hour sessions in multi-day classes and week long summer camp. In-person or Online.
Anyone can get started in learning to code! Students in our programs will discover the fun of coding and learn to use great tools on their own. This is your child’s opportunity to discover what coding is all about. Students can create their own online Code.org accounts or use one that their school may have provided. No downloads involved, just internet. We use laptops for this topic but the tools and activities used can be accessed anywhere from any computer or device. Students will leave the workshop or classes able to continue working in Code.org, saving their progress and proceed at their own pace as far as they want to go. These programs will prepare students to continue on their own to higher level coding classes with Code.org or other platforms, and pursue coding in any language.
Student accounts: We highly encourage students to have their own account with code.org so they can enjoy seeing their progress and use the many other benefits of an account. Many students already have an account created through their school. See below for how to create an account. Please bring login information for your child's code.org account. If you cannot bring access to an account, we will provide one but it can't be used at home.
Here is the sign-in/create account page: https://studio.code.org/users/sign_in
Here are ways to have an account, starting from the link above.
- any Google gmail account or public or private school email account will already give you access to a code.org account.
- use Facebook or a Microsoft account
- create an account using any private email account from any email provider.
- Bring an email account that we can use to create the account for you.
Computers for the class: Any computer or Chromebook with internet access will work for Code.org and any other online coding resources. We encourage students to bring their own computer just so they get comfortable and can continue coding at home. We will provide a computer for any student needing one.
For students in grades 7 - 12 or by permission. Offered as 1-day workshops. In-person only.
This workshop will be an easy introduction to some basic concepts of A-I and machine learning, beginning with TensorFlow, a free resource for learning about and using machine learning to solve problems. We plan to hold a number of workshops in A-I and ML and create an interest group that can meet in-person and online, collaborate on competitions such as Kaggle and on personal projects, and explore these fields in general. We will often use resources from EDX and SKLearn, and TensorFlow.
Grades 9-12 or by permission. 1-day workshops, or 1 to 2 hour sessions in multi-day classes and week long summer camps. In-person or Online.
This topic provides a good introduction to Unity and its use for game development and the application of the programming language C# to a specific project. New students will learn fundamentals of the software platform tools and libraries and each build their own level of one group game. Experienced students will work on their own complete game. Students will download the Unity development software to take part in this class.
This class will not teach coding fundamentals (see “Requirements” below).
The benefit of Unity: Unity is a development platform for creating graphics and animation in 2D, 3D, Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR). It has very wide use in industry for creating video games, films and animation for many applications. Because working in Unity involves the use of code libraries written in the language C#, it also provides a great learning path to higher levels of coding in general. Unity has a very large user base and is well supported with tutorials and forums that provide great sources of information and help.
Requirements:
- A personal interest in game design and learning about an industrial-strength game development platform.
- The class is focused on learning to use the software platform Unity and applying C# to the subject of game development. The class does not have time to teach coding fundamentals. Therefore a high comfort level with at least one programming language is necessary to be allowed to join the class. C# is ideal, Java and any other C-based language are the next most relevant languages. Strong ability in Python or Java Script is also acceptable.
- Installation of the free Unity development software is required.