Why teach coding to a 5 year old?

Should I teach my kids to learn to code at a very early stage? Should my son start to learn to code? How do I introduce my 6-year-old to coding? Should I get my child into programming? How would you explain coding to a 5-year-old boy? How can I teach my 5-year-old to code?

Ughhh.. too many questions! Doesn’t this feel overwhelming as a parent HUH.. what, why and how you should do it? The answer isn’t a yes or no or even a simple one.

What are the factors that we all should consider before getting into the deep questions? So in problem-solving first you recognize the problem, then you make a solution step by step and implement it.

Recognizing the Problem

1. Lets talk about **why you even want to teach coding to a 5 year old**. Do you want him to adapt to this field? Is he interested in this? You know about critical thinking skills and it’s importance? You’re aware of the benefits of starting learning at an early age? You want to improve problem solving skills in your kids? If you’ve answered “yes” to any three of the questions above then congratulations you’re on the right track.
2. If you haven’t made a decision yet, no worries. We will list the benefits here so you can make an aware decision about your kid’s education:

A study on Problem solving by 5–6 years old kindergarten children in a computer programming environment: A case study shows that computer programming based learning activities facilitate the development of algorithmic reasoning and problem solving capability in kids.

In their “2020 Developer Survey”, Stack Overflow noted that up to 10% professional developers started programming when they were younger than 10 years.

Coding helps in building problem-solving skills, improves creativity and so much more!

So now you know how its percentage is increasing with the passage of time and it is becoming the need.

Solving the Problem

Now you know the reason, move on to step 2 which is how to teach coding to a 5 year old and make it fun cause you know kids these days… a lot less attention span… DUH..

Here are some free resources you can look for to help your kids in learning coding.

Programming isn’t always a black screen with lots of numbers and brackets and who knows Gibberish… XD. If you want to teach coding to a very young age group, you can do so by adding visuals and that’s where comes the Block-Based Programming.

Block-based coding means that instead of typing a coding language, you drag and drop jigsaw-like pieces together to build things using different tools.

Free software available:

1. Use apps or Software like [code.org](https://code.org/en-US), [ScratchJr](https://scratchjr.org/), [Tynker](https://www.tynker.com/). These platforms offer engaging activities to make the learning easy and fun!
2. Hour of Code is an initiative by [code.org](https://code.org/en-US) to introduce kids to the basics of coding and computer science through one hour of fun and engaging sessions.

The STEM Educators:

1. The STEM Educators provides different level of programming courses suitable for even younger age group.
2. From 3 Different level of Scratch programming to python or even web development course.
3. Our curriculum focuses Project based Learning, Skills first, Tools second, All of our curriculum is designed to grow with our students, Our groups maintain a 6–1 student-teacher ratio and we also pay close attention to individual needs.
4. You can also book a free STEM explorer session to find out which course is the most suitable for you! The one good thing about this session is you don’t have to waste your money, it’s completely free so save your time and energy and get an expert advice!

Here is a link to book your STEM Explorer session: