From TANKS in Grade 7 .. to a Computer Science PhD in the future

Over the weekend of 18 to 21 March 30 Unplugged Coding Evangelists gathered in Gqeberha. Culumanco Komanisi was asked to share his story. He started playing TANKS in Grade 7, and is now Grade 11 at Alexander Road High, where he does IT as one of his subjects.

"Morning everyone…

It’s a great pleasure to come and speak to you all this morning. I am here to share my experience with TANKS powered by Tangible.

So what is TANKS you may ask??It is a software application available on Androids that introduces people of all ages to basic computational skills. The application introduces basic programming skills to its users. This application is user friendly, especially for people with absolutely no knowledge about computers, which was me at the time.?

Photo - Meets Mrs Greyling on 21 March 2022 at the RANGERS coding tournament.

When I was doing Grade 6, at Diaz Primary School, Mrs Greyling introduced a small group of learners to TANKS. I was lucky to be in that small group. I felt intimidated, because I didn’t even know how to switch on a computer- we didn’t have a computer at home. It was an honor for me, I finally got a chance to understand how a computer actually works. In the past I thought a computer was the smartest thing in this planet, but I was wrong. With my experience with TANKS, I find out that Computers are actually the dumbest things in this planet; they just follow human instructions. It is us humans who are smarter, not computers.

Photo - Learners at Diaz Primary School playing TANKS

?In this particular day, Mrs Greyling gave us Tokens and Tablets and explained to us how the Application works without actually doing an example. It was kind of tough you can image, a young Grade 6 boy with ignorance on computers, never mind programming being told to code, it was actually the opposite. The GUI (Graphical User Interface) of the application is amazing, it gives a simple guide on how to actually use the Tank Application. The application works as follows, the tokens given are set of instructions directing the tank to the respective destination. We had to structure the tokens using the minimum number of tokens as possible in a way that will direct the tank to its destination. This was very challenging for us. Whenever we couldn’t figure out a particular level and asked for assistance from Mrs Greyling , she would say “Guys I don’t know this stuff, I’m sure you know it better than I do ”, even though I thought this wasn’t true , I didn’t quite understand that response. After some years I got to understand the reason for the kind of response she gave us, I actually appreciate her for that kind of response.

Through her response I learnt how to persevere. I’m stuck in this particular level; my code is continuously crashing and I don’t know what I’m doing wrong and there is no help even though help was there. But being determined to make the code work and enjoying TANKS as a leisure activity, I got self-encouraged and preserved. I stretched my thinking capabilities to extreme measures just to make it work. I became frustrated because I wanted this tank to reach the star which is the destination but it doesn’t reach it, no matter how many times I re-structure my code. This was when I came to realize that computers are actually not smart; they just follow a bunch of instructions. ?I got to change the way I look at things. I got to see that things are not as they seem. I began to develop tactics on how to structure the code to work, this was when I developed computational thinking skills. Actually understanding how the brain of a computer works.

Photo : 3 of the Diaz boys were in the Top 20

A couple of years back, we (as a team) went to a TANKS National Tournament with our Facilitator Ayanda that was held at the Sandton Convention Centre, this was my first time to be outside Eastern Cape. There were older children from different High schools (grade 11 and 12 inclusive) that we had to compete with. Image Grade 6 learners being self-taught competing with learners in senior grades, on a coding competition. The results were amazing. I (in the final round, on a one to one competition representing my team) came 7th in the national coding competition and this was very big for us as a team and as a school. Ayanda was very proud of our achievement and celebrated our achievement even though we didn’t reach level 34 and 35. When I came back from Pretoria I felt the urge to complete the 2 levels, and I did so in my school holidays. I finally got level 34 before the reopening of school, after attempting 54 tries.

Photo - Receiving the certificate for 7th position (out of 100 learners)

In my stay in Pretoria, I developed a passion in computers. 2 years back if I’m not mistaken, during the COVID Lockdown Prof. Jean Greyling and Nomsa had an online Coding Course where we (students who were interested) were introduced to a programming language called C#. This was a thrilling experience for me because I had basic skills of programming even though it wasn’t easy. It was challenging. At school, when I was doing grade 9 all students that were interested in doing IT as their subject choice in grade 10 were introduced to Scratch. I took part in Scratch I got to apply my computational skills I learnt from TANKS. Scratch is similar but a different application to TANKS. Personally I would say TANKS was much more challenging than Scratch.

Photo - Explaining TANKS to Eastern Cape Premier Oscar Mabuyane in 2019.

In my December grade 9 holidays, I began to learn Python, programming language with a friend. I applied the logic that I used in TANKS and C#, because both in C# and TANKS I wasn’t taught the language, meaning I was taught C# or Python but programming. In my start of my grade 10 year I started coding with Delphi, which is another programming language that is part of the syllabus. When I got to Delphi programming was and is much easier for me, because I was exposed to programming in the past. ?I pass my IT practical’s with excellent grades. Sometimes it is hard when the code crashes and I don’t know what I’m doing wrong, but I preserver and I try other strategies and the code finally works. Programming is a process and a long process it requires time and effort.

Photo - At the Alexander Road High coding club

At school we have different societies and I take part in Computer Clubs, we do a lot of exciting stuff with my IT teacher Mrs Oosthuizen , where we strip the computer into pieces, getting to actually see what is inside the computer. We get to see the motherboards and all the other components in the computer. It was my first time actually seeing and physically touching a motherboard last year. In the past I only saw it in textbooks. My love for computers started from a simple TANKS game to designing my very own Hangman game which was part of my school Practical assessment last year using Delphi. I did impressively well and my IT teacher was amazed by functioning of the Game. I actually got 95,7 % for my practical !

Photo - With Prof Greyling on Saturday 19 March after presenting this talk. ?

I have a passion and dream of studying computer science in university, by the look of things I doubt a degree will be enough comparative to the passion I have in the subject. I might study further and get my PHD, like Professor Greyling a person of whom I look up to."?

Culumanco studies at Alexander Road High with a bursary from Dimension Data.