I have been mentoring at Coderdojo Brisbane since its inception earlier this year. I became involved when I responded to a request for volunteers to help children learn to develop software, which I thought was a worthwhile endeavour. I also thought that it would be a good environment to gently introduce my own children to some very basic principles of computer science.
The Coderdojo program has lived up to my expectations. However, what I didn’t expect was how much fun I would have mentoring, nor how memorable my Coderdojo experiences would actually be. At various Coderdojo sessions I have seen:
- experienced software developers from a world leading computer gaming company attend Coderdojo and collaborate with children working fastidiously to develop their own computer games. The developers’ passion for game creation immediately transferred to the children and everyone become engrossed in the work. The developers and the children became inseperable peers in the work, and it was hard to tell who was having the most fun! (Thanks to the volunteers from Halfbrick Studios!);
- seemingly shy and introverted children who would light up with excitement about the software they built – even to the point where these same children would be keen to stand up in front of the other Coderdojo participants and proudly present their creations.;
- a seven-year old girl create a very simple, but unexpectedly entertaining, 2-D graphical computer game, and she did this in just minutes using Hopscotch. Hopscotch is a visual programming language for iPads that is very similar to MIT’s (open source!) “Scratch” environment.;
- children from different cultural, ethnic, and socio-economic, backgrounds, who had never even met prior to their first Coderdojo session, autonomously break into groups to create interactive digital stories, and animated movies. The children used Carnegie Mellon University’s “Alice” (open-source!) object-oriented 3-D programming environment.;
I also didn’t expect to meet so many bright, friendly, interesting, and caring, people willing to donate several hours of their weekends to mentor the children though the learning process. Some of the mentors were experienced software developers, or university students completing their IT degrees. However others had completely different professional backgrounds such as high school teachers, research scientists, entrepreneurs, management executives, librarians, and full-time parents/caregivers. But despite their varied backgrounds, I found that every mentor would generously share his or her knowledge and ideas on how to make Coderdojo more interesting for the children. Each was passionate about ensuring that the children gained as much as possible from the program.
Coderdojo inspires children to *produce*, rather than merely *consume*, information technology. As society becomes more dependent on IT, and IT becomes even more prevalent across all industry sectors as well as our daily personal lives, children who participate in programs like Coderdojo will be significantly advantaged. These children will become “first class” citizens in the emerging digital world. They will become the leaders that ensure that Australia reaps all of the benefits from advances in digital technology and prospers in the global digital economy.
I believe these children will remember Coderdojo as the place that started them in the right direction. It is very satisfying to play a small part in their, and also Australia’s, future success. Australia’s digital future starts with Coderdojo. Come and join us!
ABC Radio has done a short piece on Coderdojo Brisbane.
Copyright © 2013 John V. Harrison. All rights reserved.
