Mike Wuerthele
Apple has opened up thousands of new Hour of Code sessions at every Apple Store location between Dec. 4 and Dec 10, with new Swift Playgrounds challenge and teacher resources available to all.
The week-long focus celebrates Computer Science Education Week. Young coders have the option of signing up for a "Kids Hour" with ages 12 and up with a different session focusing on Swift Playgrounds on the iPad. Teacher Tuesdays sessions focus on educators and how they can take what they learned in the session, and apply it to lessons in the classroom.
A brand-new Hour of Code challenge in the Swift Playgrounds app invites students to build a digital robot and customize it with new parts including cyborg eyes and electric hula hoop arms.
Apple's new Everyone Can Code curriculum includes a free Hour of Code guide featuring the new Swift Playgrounds challenge to facilitate code lessons in schools, community centers and after-school programs. Schools can host their own one-hour Hour of Code event anytime by downloading the Swift Playgrounds app and Hour of Code guide.
Each workshop will teach some of the basics of programming, making use of tutorials from Code.org. The organization works to foster programming education, and has partnered with various other groups and businesses on Hour of Code initiatives. The 2017 effort to celebrate Computer Science Education Week expands upon one offered from last year.
Users can sign up for a coding session online.
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3 Comments
They need to offer this for adults who missed computer education in school—because there wasn’t any!
I think it would be cool if Apple did an updated Swift version of the old Apple II RobotWar (and open source Crobots) virtual gaming/learning environment with all the modern graphics that would run on iOS like Playgrounds. I think the gaming-with-programming aspect would draw in novice programmers especially if the robot battles could be orchestrated using Apple's iCloud services.