This New App Teaches Kids to Code By Playing a Game
Ever since they first got their organic fruit snack-sticky paws on our screens, kids have found folders upon folders of apps to fill. These days, it’s not just different versions of Angry Birds and Hair Salon taking up our smartphone storage space, tots are learning how to code and program from the tablets that we’re just watching TV on. Sheesh.
Tynker is an online education service that teaches programming and computational thinking to the next generation, our future startup queens and Silicon Valley kings. Their iPad app Tynker makes coding a game, where kids program their way through different adventures. Savvy stroller cruisers drag and drop visual code blocks that guide (and program!) their characters to successfully complete each level. Tynker lets its players visualize coding, like a much more advanced version of the typing tests we remember doing in the computer lab at school.
Your kids could spend a few trips to Grandma and Pop-Pop’s house learning how to code by playing an iPad game in the backseat — how cool is that? Best suited for younger kids, the first adventure is free and contains 20 different challenges. You can purchase extra adventures in the app, making Tynker an affordable intro for coders ten and under, and a good test to see if you want to invest in a class.
We spotted Robot Turtles, a board game for pint-size programmers-in-training in the news around Toy Fair and knew it wouldn’t be lonely in the toy aisle for long. In order to continue stimulating STEM-related education, look out for more apps and toys that make coding a game for kids who are going to have to be more well-versed than we ever were in this crazy world we call the wide web.
So. Do they make a Tynker for tweens? Twerty-somethings?
What do you think of teaching kids programming and coding? How computer savvy are the kids you know? Share below!
