CoderZ Intros Elementary Grade Coding Course

  • By Dian Schaffhauser
  • 05/11/20

Education technology company CoderZ has introduced a new course for students in grades 2-5 to learn how to program. The new CoderZ Adventure offers 50 missions where students learn how to program virtual robots and practice math as they navigate through various locations, including "Frozen Island," "Lost City," and "Candy Town." The company, known for its gamified Cyber Robotics courses for older students, provides the curriculum behind the Amazon Future Engineer program.

The newest course has seven modules with activities covering about 10 hours of learning:

  • Basic navigation for driving and turning using Drive and Turn blocks;

  • Arithmetic practice for addition, subtraction and division;

  • Measuring distances and using the Wait block and Repeat Loops;

  • Geometry exercises with angles and parallel lines;

  • More geometry, covering the radius of a circle;

  • A practice exercise during which students draw on a virtual sketchpad using all the skills learned previously; and

  • An explore mode to measure angles and radii, where students plan the optimal route to complete a mission as quickly and efficiently as possible, given a time limit.

The program includes a teacher guide, the solutions and reporting on student progress.

A free trial is available on the CoderZ website.

About the Author

Dian Schaffhauser is a former senior contributing editor for 1105 Media's education publications THE Journal, Campus Technology and Spaces4Learning.

Featured

  • glowing golden coin surrounded by geometric lines, graphs, and stylized book icons, set against an abstract background with neutral tones, blue, and gold

    NEA Foundation 2025 Student Success Grants Application Window Opens Dec. 16

    Grants of up to $5,000 are available for educators to implement innovative and effective forms of learning.

  • a digital lock symbol is cracked and breaking apart into dollar signs

    Report: Ransomware Costs Schools Nearly $550,000 per Day of Downtime

    New data from cybersecurity research firm Comparitech quantifies the damage caused by ransomware attacks on K-12 and higher education institutions.

  • person signing a bill at a desk with a faint glow around the document. A tablet and laptop are subtly visible in the background, with soft colors and minimal digital elements

    California Governor Signs Off on AI Content Safeguard Laws

    California Governor Gavin Newsom has officially signed a series of landmark artificial intelligence bills into law, signaling the state’s latest efforts to regulate the burgeoning technology, particularly in response to the misuse of sexually explicit deepfakes. The legislation is aimed at mitigating the risks posed by AI-generated content, as concerns grow over the technology's potential to manipulate images, videos, and voices in ways that could cause significant harm.

  • futuristic VR goggles with blue LED accents, placed in front of a fantastical landscape featuring glowing hills, a shimmering river, and floating islands under a twilight sky

    Los Angeles Unified School District Adopts VR Learning Platform, Resources

    Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) recently announced a partnership with Avantis Education to bring educational virtual and augmented reality (VR/AR) solution ClassVR to its students. A news release reports that the district has already deployed more than 16,000 ClassVR headsets as part of the Los Angeles Unified Instructional Technology Initiative.