With the government’s push to have coding as a new literacy, schools will be expected to provide some experience of algorithmic thinking and coding within their curricula. This workshop is for absolute beginners in this space who are interested in learning about algorithmic thinking, block based coding and unplugged activities they can use with learners when they do not have a great deal of access to technology.

The first part of the session will explore algorithms through unplugged activities where no coding will be used, but learners (and in this case participants) will develop a strong understanding of some of the core aspects of writing an algorithm. In the second part of the session, we will explore Scratch and CSFirst as free resources that can be used in schools or in coding clubs which provides scaffolded coding activities. For the brave amongst us, you will have some playtime to move beyond block based coding and try out learning some basic python coding language.

By the end of this session, the participants will;

• have a strong understanding of algorithmic thinking
• be able to use block based coding to execute simple algorithms in Scratch
• have a bank of resources that can help them introduce algorithmic thinking and coding into their schools and curricula

Please bring along a laptop so that you can fully participate in the session.