Education Innovation Studio, Code – Make – Innovate!

Why should programming be part of the curriculum? There are justifications, even beyond neurobiology, for the use of digital media in education in general and programming as a subject in particular (methodological diversity, relevance to real life and the workplace, interaction, reflection). It's important to remember that computer science education shouldn't be solely about programming; topics like databases, security, cryptography, and modeling are equally essential components of computer science literacy. Our students need to understand how the digital world of life and work functions; simply learning a programming language isn't enough.

Advocating for the integration of coding into the curriculum often leads to accusations that content is being promoted for a small minority in the future workforce. However, information technology is of enormous importance to the economy and simultaneously offers young people excellent career prospects.

If you advocate for coding in the curriculum, you're faced with the accusation that you're promoting content for a small minority in the future workforce. Furthermore, the transformation of the professional world through the shift towards dominant media presents us with new challenges. Factual knowledge is now highly ephemeral, and school leavers are required to possess other skills, including collaboration with others. The education system is not yet adequately addressing this reality. Finally, the skills acquired through engaging with computer science are not exclusively computer science skills.

Should all students become programmers in the future? No more than should all those who learn to write become writers. Programming is part of computer science education, and this is a direct prerequisite for a multitude of professions. It also indirectly fosters skills that are and will be important for the working and personal lives of current and future generations: analytical thinking, developing problem-solving strategies, communication skills, a willingness to collaborate, and mastery of methods and tools.

For a long time, the prevailing opinion was that correct coding implementation involves a high degree of abstraction and is therefore only suitable for older students. But: if you want to awaken a love for coding, algorithms, and programming in many students, it's too late; you have to inspire and reach even very young children—ideally as early as preschool.

How can this be achieved? Possible approaches must:

a) engage children very early on 

b) have a low level of abstraction 

c) address many concepts through playful methods 

d) offer children the opportunity to "grasp"—to use all their senses 

One answer could be: EIS – Education Innovation Studio 

DLPL Primary Level 

In the DLPL Primary Level project, 100 elementary schools, divided into 20 clusters of five schools each, have received the technical equipment for playful learning in computational thinking, coding, and robotics since the 2017/18 school year. The equipment includes twelve BeeBots with accompanying materials, six Lego WeDo kits, and six tablets pre-installed with the accompanying software for working with the Lego kits and the Scratch app.