Go to Code For Kids Homepage

Code For Kids is a program that was started from an idea in early spring of 2013. At the time, we had no other programs like it. It was a one of a kind (for the most part). Over the years, Code For Kids has grown and we have had so many wonderful experiences teaching kids across Central Canada.

Over the course of the last 2 years, Code For Kids has touched the lives of over 600 kids through more than 30 events, as well as months of dedicated one-on-one tutoring in Ottawa. We will never forget the joy it gave us to watch young girls and boys figuring out tricky problems, creating new things and having fun. We watched them struggle through their frustration to develop amazing and interesting things. We will never forget the pride that our participants had in their accomplishments. We thank you for helping us to succeed in inspiring kids to code.

Over the past few years, we have had a number of helping hands, and we really appreciated all the help. Moving forward, we have lost many of those valuable resources as they have moved on to other things. For that reason, Code For Kids is saying farewell; happy in the knowledge that we have inspired and helped to raise awareness in the importance of teaching coding to the next generation. We leave you with a list of resources for your use:

A Huge Thanks To Our Sponsors

  • http://www.comptia.org/
  • http://cira.ca
  • http://shopify.ca
  • http://google.ca
  • http://adobe.ca
  • http://www.netcelerate.com/
  • http://cloud66.com

We will be leaving our Wiki page for some time so that people may continue to use its content.

I know so many of you are just starting on your journey with code, and may still be confused. I encourage you to take a look at the resources listed and search around Google!

Thank you so much for the last few years and all the best in the future,

Julian Nadeau

Founder, Code For Kids

Learning To Code : Part 1

Posted on 3

 

I’ve decided to start my journey in learning to code with HTML/CSS. This is a common starting point for many people. I am starting with HTML/CSS for a couple of reasons.

 

  • I’d like to make and modify websites
  • Its easy to get started in
  • I can expand onto my new found knowledge with Javascript, jQuery, Ruby, etc…

 

So what is HTML?

HTML stands for Hyper Text Mark Up Language. So what does that mean? A mark up language determines how data is displayed, and in this case defines the structure of webpages.

What about CSS?

CSS stands for Cascading Style Sheet. Just as it sounds, CSS styles HTML. CSS defines the appearance of how the HTML will display. CSS can define, colours, fonts, heights, widths, margins and much more. 

Tools for learning

So far I’ve used three resources to learn HTML/CSS; the traditional book, a hands on interactive website and our very own Code for Kids keynote presentation!

Traditional book:

I was given the highly recommended HTML&CSS - Design and Build Websites by Jon Duckett

I cannot recommend this book enough. It is beautiful! The book is filled with fantastic photos, clear text, amazing illustrations and does a really good job of breaking down HTML/CSS making it very simple for a new comer to learn. If you don’t think a book about HTML/CSS can be beautiful take a minute and check out this sample chapter 

Interactive website:

Although the book is great I am a hands on learner. An interactive website provides great prebuilt activities and instant results. I am using Tree House  and Codecademy although there are many other great websites out there. One benefit to Tree House is that they offer a lot of different courses, like iOS, Android, and plain old business. Currently Codecademy has a somewhat limited curriculum. Tree House does however charge a monthly rate after your free trial runs out while Codecademy is free. 

Code for Kids keynote slides:

Before I picked up the book or logged into the website I read our presentation on HTML and CSS.  It was a clear and concise, a perfect primer to learning HTML and CSS

 

In part two of this blog I will go into what I've found challenging, tips and tricks I’ve discovered as I have progressed and the enjoyment I am having learning HTML and CSS

 

Have you taken our HTML/CSS course? Have you started to code any language recently? I would love to hear about your experiences. Leaves us your thoughts in the comment section.

 

Steve Nicol 

Code For Kids 

Blogger/Mentor

Twitter: @CodeForKids

Facebook: /CodeForKids

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