Code Red: Computing in schools

Have you seen coding hit the headlines recently? There are lots of reasons why it’s top of the agenda at the moment. Research has found that around half of young people think they know more about computing than their teachers. Since the curriculum changed in September, there’s a skills gap for teacher regarding computer science across the country.

I work for an organisation called Code Club Pro who are trying to address this knowledge gap. We're a not-for-profit and we work by finding computer science experts across the country to give up a few hours of their year to share their knowledge with teachers. We visit different cities to train up techies on training days to go into their local schools - we’ve been everywhere, from Bristol to Newcastle.

Training days are a lot of fun. We get to work with incredibly dedicated and passionate people. Often people come to us with no previous experience in teaching and training and they leave with an arsenal of tips, tricks and new skills. Here’s what one of expert trainers had to say:

“I signed up for Code Club Pro as soon as I heard about it. The training was very impressive: giving us a thorough grounding in how to run effective CPD sessions in a very hands-on and wide-ranging way.” Adam Cohen-Rose, trainer.

What we’re doing in schools

Our crack team of experts are going into schools to help teachers demystify the curriculum. We use real life examples and easy to understand exercises. Take an algorithm - which is a set of instructions to achieve a particular outcome. It seems a lot less complicated (and more fun!) when the algorithm is to make the perfect jam sandwich. Check out thishttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=leBEFaVHllEvideo andhttp://code-it.co.uk/resources/sandwich_algorithm.pdflesson plan. Have you ever tried playing a banana piano? We love the Makey Makey at Code Club Pro. Try it for yourself!

Our training is run all over the country by tech experts and computer science enthusiasts. Our sessions demystify the new curriculum, explain key language and provide useful materials to use in and out of the classroom. They aren’t boring either. Just like our Code Clubs, we learn through doing and having fun. Here’s what teachers say about us.

"Thank you for making our first session really informative and injecting enthusiasm into our team. Really excited about understanding the new concepts in computing. Michael was amazing at making the session fun, exciting and very clear.” Evelyn Deeney, Kingsmead

You can book a session with one of our expert trainers or visit our website. Chat to us on Twitter at @codeclubpro.