Processing Chicago 6/8 @ 4pm: Teaching Programming

In light of a growing worldwide push to blend programming and computational literacy into curricula in primary and secondary levels of education, we will explore the challenges and implications of incorporating programming concepts and techniques into various subjects for a range of ages/grades. The meeting will consist of two workshops and a panel discussion.



WORKSHOP ONE

Techniques for teaching Scratch, a project by the Lifelong Kindergarten Group at the MIT Media Lab that enables "young people to learn to think creatively, reason systematically, and work collaboratively." Scratch is a graphical programming language suitable for a variety of ages and abilities. Scratch introduces visually many key structures and techniques common to a broad range of programming languages and paradigms.


WORKSHOP TWO

Techniques for teaching Processing to a variety of grade levels. Although perhaps too complex for very young students, Processing provides a very forgiving development environment for the exploration of programming concepts and techniques.


PANEL DISCUSSION

Following the workshops, we will convene an informal panel of educators, technologists and artists to initiate a discussion. Panel members TBA.