Teaching Programming to 5- to 11-year-olds

This course will help you to become more confident in teaching programming to young children. As well as developing your own understanding of programming, you'll also investigate a range of strategies that you can employ to help your pupils.

During this course, you'll learn about the key programming concepts of algorithms, sequence, repetition, selection, and variables. You'll experience a number of different programming languages suitable for young people, and use your new knowledge to modify and create programs in the block-based language Scratch.

The course will also introduce you to program design. You'll learn about and experience all of the stages of program development from idea to running code.

By the end of the course, you'll be able to design and code your own Scratch programs, as well as being able to support your young learners as they begin their coding journeys.

Week 1 - Introduction to programming

• What is programming?
• What's an algorithm?
• Moving from an algorithm to code

Week 2 - Repetition

• Identifying patterns in tasks
• Implementing repetition
• Different types of repetition

Week 3 - Selection

• Conditions
• Implementing selection
• Controlling program flow with selection

Week 4 - Variables

• What are variables?
• How can variables be used in programs?
• Adapting a learning resource for your class