I’m the first to admit that my kids, like most kids, do like to spend time on screens, whether it’s a tablet, a computer or a TV.
When we got the opportunity to try a free coding lesson with Cypher, it seemed a good opportunity to make the screen time more valuable than just playing games and watching movies.
I signed my 10-year-old daughter up for a free 60-minute online class with Cypher. Cypher teaches children how to code, through weekly teacher-led, online lessons with small groups of children of similar ages and experience levels. Cypher are experts in teaching coding principles, getting kids involved and developing core coding skills over time.
Although my daughter was a little apprehensive before it started, she absolutely loved it. I can see why children love their creative themes, such as animals, magic and art. The teacher was brilliant – just the right level of energy for kids that have grown out of CBeebies but still need a subject to be made fun and engaging.
They started the lesson with introductions and working out how much coding they’d all done before. Most had done some ITC lessons at school and some of the children had had a few Scratch lessons (memories of home-schooling come flooding back) but they were all beginners really. They got a crash course in some of the techniques first, but quickly started writing their own code and had actually built their own game by the end of the lesson!
My daughter was so happy at the end of the lesson and really proud of what she’d built. Unlike the drag-and-drop coding she’d been used to before with Scratch, she was taught how to type code (in Javascript, I’m reliably informed) and she carried on tweaking it long after the lesson was finished.
The teacher was really good at keeping the kids engaged and she was on hand whenever any of them got stuck, encouraging my daughter to share her screen at one point when she couldn’t work out what was going wrong. I was amazed at how well the kids navigated the Zoom Call!
Cypher offers these free coding lessons for all children and they have different content for younger kids – who will learn using Scratch – and older kids who code with Javascript.
If they enjoy their first free lesson, they can go on to have weekly online coding lessons with a group of children of similar age and experience. They build a new project every couple of weeks and I can see that they’d learn a lot over the course of a few months.
According to Cypher, it’s all about getting kids future-ready. Already, 67% of new jobs in STEM are in computing and the importance of technology in the industry is only going to increase. Their award-winning curriculum not only teaches kids how to code but also develops broader skills such as creativity, communication and collaboration.
The lesson got a big thumbs up from us and some of our fellow Mumblers too, who had children of different ages enjoy a free lesson.
“…the teacher was fab and it’s literally the longest I’ve seen him sit down and listen! ” – Gateshead Mumbler (Mini Mumbler aged 6)
“…it’s been amazing! X Loved it, I’ve learned loads too!” – Hull Mumbler (Mini Mumbler aged 11)
*A sponsored blog post for Cypher
