Coding Lessons Made Easy
If you’ve been following along here on the blog and on social media these past few months, you’ve seen me post about our experiences with the Bitsbox and how much we are loving it. If you are new here, Bitsbox is a subscription program that sends a monthly box of resources that will have your kids coding apps in 5 minutes and have a blast doing it. Really. I’m not kidding. 5 minutes.
Teaching Kids To Code
We are on month number three of our subscription that Bitsbox gave us to try out and review. So far, the 11 year old has created games, birthday cards, illustrated stories, and cool stuff like animated dragons and a magic wand. He has, also, learned to customize his creations using his new coding skills. It’s one of the few things we’ve tried that has kept his attention.
He learned the basics of code and building an app from the first box. It contained fun, full-color cards with the code for simple apps. The code was copied right from the card into the Bitsbox website’s user screen. This code created the app. Using this copy method, he quickly learned the structure of code and what happens if even one character is missing or out of place.
The second Bitsbox contained instructions to add variables to the basic codes from the first box, plus it contained many more apps to create. He learned to add things like sound and color and to change images and the size of images.
The third box contained instruction cards that helped him build further upon those variables learned in box 2. This allowed my son to challenge himself and his new found coding skills. I was amazed at how easy those skills came to him. By the third box, he discovered the logic in code and how all the variables fit together.
Make Coding Lessons Fun
Not only is my son learning to code, he is having fun doing it. He rips open the boxes when they are delivered and dives into the instruction cards. He thinks Bitsbox is a game. I don’t dare tell him that Bitsbox is actually coding lessons.
He spends hours creating new apps and changing old ones. He’s even got his 15 year old sister coding with him. She has taken Java coding classes, so this is old hat for her, but according to her this is coding for fun.
Get Bitsbox
You can try Bitsbox for yourself. Bitsbox can be ordered as a one-time app coding kit or as a monthly subscription. Once your kids start they most likely will be like my son and not want to stop, so go ahead and get the montly subscription. Use my special discount code SCIENTIST20 when you order and get 20% off the first payment of any Bitsbox subscription. (The coupon does not apply to subscription renewals or one-time product shop. All subscriptions automatically renew on the 1st of every month.)
To learn more about Bitsbox:
- Visit the Bitsbox website
- Sign up for the Bitsbox mailing list
- Subscribe to the Bitsbox teachers list
- Follow Bitsbox on social media: