Thrasher is offering a coding club for third- and fourth-graders starting Jan. 9.Thrasher Elementary is bringing back its computer science and coding club, the Coding Panthers, before school Mondays, Jan. 9 through April 10 from 7:15-8 a.m. The club will be lead by Tony Donen, principal of STEM School Chattanooga and a Thrasher parent, and will be held at the school in Raquel Newman’s fourth-grade classroom.
The club was popular when it was first offered several years ago, said Tracey Peele, a special education teacher at Thrasher who agreed to be the club’s faculty sponsor. She said she feels coding is an important skill for the students to be able to learn.
Student interest is evident – 20 spots had already filled just a week after the club was first announced. Those interested should sign up now, said Peele, because the club is limited to 30 participants.
“If you look at what’s expected of them in middle and high school – and in life in general – coding will play a much bigger part of their future than it did in my generation,” she said, as to why she feels elementary school is an ideal time to start building these skills. “It will be interesting to see the digital landscape for these kids, and I think the sooner we can introduce it, the better for them.”
Open to Thrasher third- and fourth-graders, the Coding Panthers will learn about coding through puzzles combining programming concepts using the website code.org, which Donen said most students have already used. Throughout the spring semester, club members will complete Course 4 on code.org, preparing them to move on to acquire more advanced skills through Khan Academy, a nonprofit educational website offering free courses. Through Khan, they will learn the JavaScript language, as well as learn drawing and animation using JavaScript.