We recently had the pleasure of wrapping up our first after-school program at Convent Glen Catholic school in Ottawa, and were excited to see it covered by Ottawa Community News. During eight sessions, our experienced instructors visited the school once a week, working through lessons and programs on our coding software. Though the students had different levels of experience, they all took great strides in the eight-week program.

After being introduced to the basics and going through some simple coding projects, the students (ranging from grades 2 to 6), were then given the freedom to choose what projects they wanted to work on for the last few weeks. An example of a project that students loved was a ping-pong style game.

On the last day, the students were tasked to break down and replicate a completed project provided by Hatch Canada - a scene from the Harry Potter books involving a Quidditch game.

Our wonderful coaches were there at every step, helping the students learn the ins and outs of Javascript in just an hour each week. We asked Hatch Coach extraordinaire, Benson [hyperlink to Benson blog], to comment on the importance of the after-school programs.

“After school coding programs are important for young students because learning code is not just fun but will help them think in a new way. Learning code allows students to think more logically, helps students think of different solution to multiple problems. It allows students to work more efficiently and finally it sets them up for the future. All of those skills can be learned from just a hour a week after-school. Having afterschool programs is cool because you get to learn new skills outside of the school curriculum but at school.”

- Benson

We couldn’t agree more with Benson and with Ottawa Community News when they said the sky’s the limit with Javascript.

Is coding right for your child? Read about our amazing programs, try us out for FREE or email us at hatch@hatchcanada.com to find out more. And if you loved this post, don’t forget to share it on Facebook to spread the word!