DS in tears over school coding club what do you think?

[Mrskeepforgettingmywords]

Signed DS up to after school coding club he has begged me for months and I changed my hours at work so he could go. He left school Thursday in tears he said the teacher sat on her laptop the whole time and handed the kids iPads. He said it was really difficult and when he asked for help she said I don’t have enough time now.

When I picked him up he bursted in to tears right away he has been waiting to go for months so it is that instant disappointment.

Would you expect a coding club to teach kids? Or is it just a get together.

Sadly, many schools tell teachers that they have to run an after school club whether they want to or not. Also, they don’t actually pay the teachers to do so. Often, it means that the teacher then has to do their marking and prep for the next day after the club has finished, or they choose a club whereby they just supervise the children rather than teach them.

I used to run a chess club at my school.

I had two sessions, one more of a lesson for beginners and one a turn up and play.

I've seen a lot if stuff aimed at teachers saying "you can set up a code/french/chess club at school with our resources it's really easy and no knowledge required".

Fell into that trap myself once.

Is it a free after school club and is it a state school? If you have to pay I'd expect better engagement. Why is your son in tears? Is it because the course doesn't align to his expectations?

Someone already has linked code club website to you. Depending on the DC, the examples are very simple and mainly self guided. I've given them to both DC during holidays. You don't have to pay anyone to follow that unless it's for some social fun.

I actually don't think most of the teachers can teach coding. DC1 Year 8 curriculum is supposed to be doing Python but her ICT teacher told us matter of factly that kids needs more MS office skills so she spent the term doing Powerpoint and Word instead. What a total waste of time. DC1 has been doing her work on Powerpoint and Word since primary school, and so has many of her peers. I think it's just the teacher can't do it so she made up an excuse.

Is it a free school club ran by teachers? We have to do a club every term and I hate it. It bites into my own time and often it's in something I have zero interest in. I'm not saying it's right, but I suspect the teacher that's been roped into it isn't that clued up on coding and the school pressured them into running it. Not acceptable, but I wouldn't assume the teacher was just purposefully nasty; speak to the school and ascertain exactly what the club can offer and what should be happening and decide whether it's worth continuing.

To the OP, if you child is 7 and has never coded before, go to https://codeclub.org/en/learn-to-code which a PP has linked, and start him on scratch. Both scratch and the web design one are very easy to do without adult guidance.

I actually don't think most of the teachers can teach coding

To be expected really, especially at secondary school level. I don't think many with a suitable degree are clamouring to earn a crap wage in a high stress environment when they have plenty of other options. Coding 'training' at primary ranges from zero to a tiny bit, I wouldn't expect teachers to spend masses of their own time learning it either.

@Sugarflub agreed. I wasn't blaming the teacher. She clearly has no skills in it above using Office. More the change in cirriculumn from ICT to computing means there is a total lack of teachers who can actually teach it.

I think when my kids did coding in primary school they had to sit and follow the instructions given by the computer. It seems wrong that the teacher wasn’t able to assist but as a one off it’s understandable something urgent might have come up. As others say, teachers are already very stretched but I personally would expect assistance from the teacher but not necessarily a lesson as such.

Sounds like it’s not the club for him. Loads like the idea of coding but in reality it’s not for them.

Speak to the school

Is there a coderdojo club nearby? They’re usually held in non school venues. I used to attend one with DS when he was that age. It was run by volunteers and often several of the parents who worked in IT would volunteer to help out whilst their kids attended the club. Our schools don’t really do any after school clubs other than sports clubs.

https://codeclub.org/en/coderdojo-community

Ours was great as they regularly had sessions on robotics as one local chap was a robotics nerd so brought all his gadgets in and showed the children how to write simple codes to make them move and pick up stuff etc.

I’d forget about school clubs with dis-interested teachers. It’s not fair on anyone.

Is the club free? And is this a state school?

The standard of extra curriculars in state schools now can be so low unfortunately because teachers are just so busy. If this were a private school I would probably complain. And if you were paying for the club I would definitely demand my money back! Otherwise I don’t think there’s much you can do. Can you find something online for him to access?

If he’s just joined partway through the term, is it possible the other children have been working on something from the start, so he would have been a bit lost trying to join in?

I strongly disagree. Surely, it’s not the club for that teacher to supervise as they’re clearly not interested in the subject matter or motivating the kids?

Ask him what the other children in the class were doing- if the teacher won’t help, you can talk to the other children it’s a club

Obviously I'm as old as Methuselah, but IIJM who is amazed that kids are coding (or indeed, wanting to) at age 7? At that age, I'd have thought concentrating on reading...?

Coding is a great thing for him to be into, DS got into it at that age and is now doing a software engineering degree apprenticeship. He may well be frustrated by using an iPad as they're not ideal for coding although can be used. He probably got upset because he was so excited at the idea of the club and then it was the absolute opposite of what he was expecting.

The teacher was being really mean by not helping him even for a few minutes - what a waste of time running a club for the children and then not even having a few minutes to help. What was he doing on the iPad? if he knows what the program was you could have a look at it and he might have a better understanding for next time. I would have him go another time and if it's still the same and he doesn't enjoy it then let him decide if he wants to stop.

Does he have a laptop at home where he can use Scratch at all? That 's how DS started, it's really good - so good he was reluctant to move onto Python which he considered far too much work! (It's now his favourite however) The other thing he loved was lego mindstorms but he wasn't so into raspberry pi.

As he gets older (secondary school age +) the Unity Junior Programmer course is brilliant for learning C# (and making your own games!). But not something to move onto from scratch, get him doing lots of free 'learn Python for kids' type things when he's ready to move on from Scratch.

Coding club doesn’t run like that, they do tasks individually working through a programme with the facilitator providing a little support. You can access the software from home for free.

It depends whether it is something that the school provide for free and basically force a teacher to give up time, for no extra pay, to do something that they don't want to do. If that's the situation, then I can see the teacher's point of view - sad as that is.

On the other hand, if you have paid for this either directly or via a private school, then it's absolutely disgraceful.

Are teachers forced to run after school clubs?

Are teachers forced to run after school clubs?

In many cases, yes.

What happens if they say no?
I'm not being goady, I know things are very tough in schools, but I didn't realise teachers were forced into these things.

Even when their contract doesn't stipulate it? Would their union help in these situations?

In many (most?) private schools teachers are expected to run an after school club.

It's not universal in state schools by any means but I have worked in quite a few schools where every teacher is expected to run an after school club.

What happens if you say no? Well, if it's because you area single parent with three kids and an elderly mum you look after they say well ok you don't have to but don't tell anyone.

It comes under "any other reasonable duties". In one school I worked in it was counted towards the 1265 so EVERyONE had to do it elderly mum or not.

I helped out with Code Club at my children's primary school on a few occasions. It was only offered to years 5 and 6 and they had at least 2 helpers each week. Expecting 7 year olds to be able to do it with no adult input seems a bit unrealistic. Maybe have a chat with the teacher about whether he's a bit young for it?