Kids who code: Is enough done to get children in to coding at a young age?

After the incredible success of our ‘Women in Technology event’ held last week, one of our amazing speakers brought up the subject of getting children interested in technology at an early age.

Naturally with the progression of technology over the last 25 years, their exposure to technology is at an all-time high, whether it is staring at the Ipad watching endless re-runs of Pepper Pig to spending the weekend and evening hours on video games way above their age-grade like Call of duty, causing mayhem (I am just bitter as they are far better than I am- long gone are the days of Goldeneye on the N64).

But the question is, is this enough to get them interested in how the software they use on a daily, if not hourly, basis actually works?

I recently looked in to what initiatives are being run to really get Children in to technology/ coding, and I would be intrigued to hear your stories about our first exposure to the world of software development, and what we can do for the next generation to be the innovator rather than the consumer?

Subconscious Bias

Today, I met with a Managing Director at a tier 1 Investment Bank, who is also head of their push on diversity globally, which is at the forefront of their agenda. We discussed issues such as getting more Females of all ages in to technology and what social biases we can overcome to achieve this. 

He runs a coding class at his local school in the evenings. Initially, he had 11 slots and all of them were taken up by Boys. The next week, He went and asked more of the girls around the school as to whether they would be interested, and got an overwhelmingly positive response. It turned out that the root of the problem stemmed from Parents with a subconscious Bias as to what their daughters would be interested in, did not show them the leaflet at all. Is this where the problem starts?

Below are a few organisations who put an emphasis on getting the next generation to interact with the mechanics behind their Favorite Apps & games.

Young Rewired state was founded by one of our amazing speakers at the event we hosted, please  visit the link below to see the amazing work they do.

I'd love to hear your thoughts on how you were introduced to coding, what age you were and the challenges you faced as a child/ now perhaps as a parent to get your children interested in how things work. 

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