Even parents who don’t know how to write computer code understand that digital literacy plays a huge role in our technologically-driven world. That’s why so many rushes to sign up their kids for coding classes that teach children how to write the code that will get them a job today and change tomorrow’s world.
However, many trickle-down benefits from learning code help to develop a child’s mind. Let’s look at a few benefits of learning to code that flies a bit under the radar.
Coding is a Language
People don’t tend to classify coding languages as languages the way they would Spanish or French. Learning any coding language promotes some general tendencies or habits of mind, but each coding language has its own rules or syntax.
Look for an online coding class that focuses on popular languages, such as:
- Python
- Java
- JavaScript
- C#
- C++
People who speak multiple languages reportedly think differently in each one. Similarly, kids who know multiple coding languages will be that much more adept at tackling coding challenges.
Not to mention they’ll have the direct skills employers look for. When kids can write code in multiple languages, it changes their approach to coding in each one and increases the odds they’ll know what employers want them to know. It’s amazing how inexhaustible the permutation of 1s and 0s can really be.
STEM Skills Promote Critical Thinking
Enrolling in a coding course online with RP4K helps to promote highly transferrable critical thinking skills. When someone plays a video game or explores an app or website, they navigate the coder’s finished product.
Before that was finalized, they made a lot of mistakes! These mistakes are vital learning opportunities. Each one needed to be solved, and together, a coder’s journey helps them take on challenges that have nothing to do with coding.
Developing STEM skills helps people learn to think like engineers do. Coding solutions often require creative, outside-the-box problem-solving.
If your child takes coding classes, they might not become a professional video game coder, systems analyst, or any other countless jobs that computer knowledge opens up. But they’ll be more comfortable and experienced in thinking laterally.
Coding Boosts a Child’s Self Esteem
Sometimes, people beat themselves up over mistakes they’ve made and downward spiral after being too hard on themselves. The desire to achieve perfection or at least pursue high standards might be noble, but coding teaches that mistakes aren’t just something to accept because they’re inevitable eventually — they’re good.
Mistakes teach you what does and doesn’t work. They’re an essential part of problem-solving. Aside from the direct lesson that a certain approach to coding won’t work, the underlying lesson kids absorb is that making mistakes is OK!
Kids will become lifelong learners when learning feels comfortable and enjoyable for them. This understanding prepares them for a world where other people make mistakes and helps them adjust in advance.
When they’re in small online coding classes of four students or less, they’ll get the educational and emotional support they need to exit the class with a boost to their self-esteem. They’ll feel the satisfaction of seeing their errors corrected and how mistakes are just part of the process to get things right.
Programming is Collaborative
Like-minded people with hobbies in common often form communities, a place to come together and talk shop, pose questions, and take their subject further. The world of coding is profoundly interconnected and collaborative.
The online community of coders can problem-solve and put their heads together to find answers to challenging questions quickly. Whether you’re in the room with one coder or you’d like to connect with the wider coding community, the culture of coding embraces teamwork and a hive-mind mentality.
Programmers often work in teams or groups to search for bugs and tackle different aspects of a project. It’s important for children to develop the skills necessary to work effectively with other people, as this is transferrable and can be widely applied in any future job or project.
Teamwork is one of the soft skills computer programmers develop when they learn how to write code. Getting along with people is a fundamental life skill that transcends the workplace — humans are social creatures! When kids learn how to collaborate from a young age, they’re better adjusted when doing projects at school, working with colleagues, or hanging out with friends and family.
Coding is creative
Learning to code promotes creativity on different levels. Programmers need to be agile thinkers when tackling a specific coding task, but there are also unlimited things they could possibly want to code! Leading online coding classes revolve around teaching kids how to make their own video games.
At first, the games are relatively simple, like one resembling Pac-Man. However, today’s video games are nothing like the games of decades ago. One reason why the video game industry’s value has overtaken Hollywood is that today’s video games combine multiple forms of art at once — the level of storytelling, graphics, music, and game play is vastly superior to games a decade ago.
A person with ample coding skills will be an asset to any workplace, even if it doesn’t appear to be related to coding on the surface. For example, every city’s parks department has a website that needs dynamic features and content, requiring a programmer. Whether this coder uses creativity in the course of their work or decides to turn an app, website, or video game they imagine into reality, the creative muscles they develop when learning to program will play a role.
Parents might want their kids to take coding classes to get the direct skills that tomorrow’s jobs will likely require. That’s reason enough to sign them up. Coding jobs can be lucrative and open many doors. Even if today’s student never applies these computer skills in their eventual job, the various soft skills they pick up from coding class will serve them well down the road.
