Online Tools for codeclub

It appears that most of the CodeClub material can be practiced in the Cloud as it were, without having any particular software installed locally other than a modern browser.

Scratch has had an entirely web hosted version since May 2003.

For creating web sites they mention Thimble on the resources page. This brilliant tool can be used for most of the tutorials. It appears to struggle a bit with the exercise that uses CSS, 6 - Hide the Ninja's. The images supplied in the project materials will need to be uploaded somewhere accessible.  Amend the URL's to pickup the image location and amend the street corner declaration block to set the background to not repeat. Place the images in a location that does not result in a 'security - mixed content' error. Placing the images in a SquareSpace gallery worked for me as follows [UPDATE - gallery expired].

  background:url(https://static.squarespace.com/static/537c7f23e4b0b9e2ae500c6b/537c7ff4e4b04863dea97e1b/537c932ce4b0682a2ca2d5bc/1400673081445/street_corner.png?format=500w);   position: absolute;
  background-repeat: no-repeat;

This gist shows some of the other basic HTML syntax that is demonstrated, just paste it into the Thimble window.

For the Python projects try Sculpt. This is an entirely in-browser implementation of Python written using JavaScript - it is a very cool thing. For the turtle examples you will need to actually declare the turtle object.

import turtle
t = turtle.Turtle()
t.forward(30)

There are other Python editors available over the web, for example pythonanywhere and Nitrous.IO,  but they don't appear to handle the Turtle library. If anyone can get these to work I'd be interested to know how.


[Update] Perhaps a bit advanced for the average 10 year old but there is an in-browser implementation of UNIX here. Perfect for learning a little Emacs

Primary School Computing

I have had an interest in this for some time as my kids have been getting bigger. For a number of years the primary schools computing curriculum had a focus around ICT, learning Word and Excel and the like, and not programming. In next years curriculum the focus is moving to problem solving and creation of 'dynamic' content and away from just the usage of technology products. I think this will encourage much more involvement and understanding.

I do have some concerns that small schools will struggle to deliver the full breadth of the new curriculum. Teachers are very busy and rightly focus on the basics. Finding the time to develop the skills need to deliver this teaching and arrange the provision of the necessary resources will be a stretch for many.

The curriculum includes the safe use of computing resources, how to gather and organize  information as well as programming. It is not prescriptive in these areas - which could lead to a variety of approaches with different levels of effectiveness.  The codeclub approach to the programming elements looks very useful. For example for 9 year olds the resources cover the graphical Scratch programming tool, website creation and a simple text based programming language called Python (Python skills can later be used on the Raspberry Pi). 

After a two year pause while the new curriculum has been put together some schools will have neglected their hardware while others I know have made big investments in tablets and PCs. Some of the approaches to provisioning hardware have costs which are not always apparent at the start. Desktops need a lot of management and even the best 'Apps' will have limits and costs. The Chromebook approach might be the most cost effective route for many schools. The machines are less expensive to purchase, the management much easier and the resources free or inexpensive. The 'Cloud' as a development space is becoming more capable and simple. The current version of Scratch is best accessed in its web based version. Python & Ruby can be learnt easily in web hosted ways. 

I have not tried the Raspberry PI yet. While it is an inspirational device I think it has some drawbacks for teaching programming in an educational setting. The fact that a separate screen and keyboard and in some instances a protective case are required is a problem. This is a lot of clutter. Some schools may want to re-cycle old peripherals: it should be noted that there is no VGA connector on the PI so a separate converter would be required to use an old monitor. If very old keyboards are being used than a PS/2 to USB adapter may also be required.