Osoyoos Elementary School students Nalani Paisley (left) and Landon Cooley took part in a coding workshop Tuesday at the library. The Canada Learning Code’s Code Mobile came to the library as part of a federally funded program that teaches students from kindergarten to Grade 7 about computer coding. (Michele Weisz)
The Canada Learning Code’s Code Mobile made a stop last week at the Osoyoos branch of the Okanagan Regional Library to teach students about how fun computer coding can be.
During the workshop, elementary school students were given a taste of how coding works by participating in fun activities that incorporate basic computer code into games.
Kelowna Code mobile communications lead Tory Braun introduced the students to Dash, a robot with flashing lights controlled by a tablet. The kids could change the colour of Dash’s heart and ears and control its direction by using an app.
The students were paired into groups of two and each group had the opportunity to try out one of four interactive coding stations.
The stations included coding Dash to play music on a xylophone using a tablet, playing computer games on a laptop, using household conductive materials, like sponges and spoons, to draw on a laptop and using a joystick-style touchscreen app to control the movement of numerous Dashes who then squared off in a soccer match.
The students erupted into joyous whoops and applause at the mention of robot soccer.
Braun explained to the kids, in terms they could understand, that by holding a ground wire they were completing an electric circuit.
“Your body is helping power the game to make it work,” she said.
The Canada Learning Code is a federal program whose objective is to provide Canadians, with a particular emphasis on girls, people with disabilities and Indigenous youth, with the digital knowledge they need to get ahead in a digital society.
Their website states: “We envision a prosperous Canada in which all people have the knowledge and confidence to harness the power of technology to achieve economic and personal fulfillment.”
The Code Mobile, a federally funded initiative of CanCode which began in 2016, is a fleet of 14 vans, led by a regional code squad, that travels across the region holding coding workshops for students from kindergarten to Grade 7. The program has plans to expand into middle and high schools this winter.
“We’re trying to make it accessible, coding education,” Braun said.
She explained that the program tries to get students to think creatively and to get excited about creating games rather than just playing them.
“At the end of the workshops they get so excited, they go ‘I’m going to go home tonight and make a game!’ It’s really cool.”
After the initial workshop, principals can request that the squad come back into the classrooms. They also have a program to instruct teachers so that they can learn to teach coding to their students.
“It’s a very easy sell,” Braun said. “A lot of teachers want to get more of those concepts into the classroom.”
Library technician Joanne Schaffrick was responsible for bringing the program to the Osoyoos Library. She made the request in May after reading a memo sent from the Okanagan Regional Library’s head office.
“We had starting doing some coding programs with some packages we have within the library system…so I was like ‘what an awesome opportunity,’” Schaffrick said.
She said that when she spoke to the principal about bringing the Code Mobile to the library so that the elementary students could attend the workshop, he was very enthusiastic.
“It’s something that they can continue. It’s not just a one-time thing…the teachers can book the Code Mobile to come back and do the actual coding of how to make this game, not just play it but how to make it,” Schaffrick said.
MICHELE WEISZ
Osoyoos Times
Rory Antonello (left) and Dexter Stewart remotely control the robot Dash as it plays soccer. (Michele Weisz photo)
