I just stumbled across this blog title in my drafts from over a year ago. 'Don't teach code' Which is timely as I just arranged to start a 'Code Club' at one of our local Primary schools.

The benefits of 7 year olds in Wales learning code are similar to those of them learning Ancient Greek; it's not going to help them tie their shoelaces. What they do need is to be able to solve problems.

If they were trying to learn the story of the Iliad given the source material of Venetus A, learning Ancient Greek would be very useful. And if they are trying to create a simple computer game, knowing how to use something like Scratch would be advantageous. In both these situations however, the problem comes first.

Our young people and educators need the skills and resources to adapt to changes, to be able to make mistakes in order to learn from them, and to be able to play and test and experiment without necessarily having to find a correct answer. Space and time for this is sadly lacking in today's climate of continuous assessment. Hopefully as an extra-curricular activity we will have the freedom to explore.

Any suggestions for a better name than 'Code Club'!?