What will happen when you teach programming to junior high school girls?

ByJohn Gillespie

Contrary to the current situation where the demand of engineers who acquired knowledge of programming is increasing worldwide, it is speculated that young people have no opportunity to learn programming and the number of programmers will decrease in the future . Meanwhile, President Obama tried to learn the code for American citizensCalling outAfter all, Facebook, Apple, Microsoft told the children, "Let's program for only one hour"Calling outThere is a movement to encourage children to learn programming, such as to do, and a project to teach coding for junior high school girls on this extension was done in Michigan State, USA.

I Spent Spring Break Teaching Girls to Code - Bright - Medium
https://medium.com/bright/i-spent-spring-break-teaching-girls-to-code-ef14cf2ddf84

Christian Lee, thought to teach girls junior high school students programming, when he was just a high school student, while attending high schoolC ++ (Seaplus Plus)It seems that my life has changed by studying. Mr. Lee had the experience of creating a website with HTML with his brother at the time of elementary school 3rd year, and at that time it was a website design that was often used by neon blue, an animation that shone in rainbow color, a slow loading image,Comic SansIt seems that they made page titles using bold fonts. "Although it seems like a nightmare to remember old works for many web developers, for me it was the first step to step into the path of computer science with amazing possibilities," Lee says.

Lee who began learning C ++ in the first grade of high school seems to have been satisfied with the joy of spreading the possibilities that have never been thought about until now when he gains technical knowledge. Lee is an NPO organization that tells children the fun of science and technology "FIRST"As a student programmer in the World Robot Championship, he also attended the Summer Course at Stanford UniversityJavaYaMATLABIt seems that he studied. In Hackathon, held in San Francisco, we created a web application to translate sign language into text, and the technology that Lee can use has improved dramatically compared to the HTML site we made in the past.

Lee is a woman in the picture below.


While studying programming, Lee gradually began to think that other students wanted the same experience as myself. Since there are few female engineers in the technology industry, girls' I thought that I wanted to help you learn. Incidentally,NCWITAccording to the survey, among the acquirers in the computer science degree in 2013, only 18% of the female students are rattled, compared with the 37% in 1985 the ratio has fallen sharply.

According to Lee, the reason why there are few women in the computer science department is "The Apollo plan created a program for the spacecraft to land on the moonMargaret HamiltonAnd developed a compiler in the US NavyGrace HopperI think that it is because female engineers such as Bill Gates and Steve Jobs hid behind and are not so famous. "

So Lee decided to start a "Hello World" plan for the alma mater's students while they are in high school. "Hello World"Is a sentence that is used to verify that the program is running by outputting" Hello World "on the first line when creating a program using a new language, girls junior high school students with little programming experience It seems that I thought that it was a perfect name as a program for.

Hello, World!


Inside of the Hello World project, Mr. Lee thought that Mr. Lee thought about everything, including programming exercises and lunch parties on the team. Lee seems to be able to receive support as a sponsor for many companies and organizations such as Google and Microsoft by making good use of personal connections when participating in programming tournaments.

The Hello World program took place during the spring vacation for a week and 30 girls from nine middle schools gathered to study the coding. The program seems to be content that learns computer science using several software and tools as follows.

·ScratchHow to make games using
· Software that can create Android applications ·App InventorDevelop apps with
· Robot for computer science education "FinchCreate a robot program with "
· Website created with HTML / CSS

Through the project, female students not only study programming but also exchange with women engineers who are active in companies, visit facilities of Google in Ann Arbor, Michigan, etc. From the various aspects computer science influences everyday life I learned to give that.


Lee was surprised at the enthusiasm for studying female students as he advanced the Hello World project. For example, one student made Finch's autonomous exercise program without lunch, another student saved his / her HTML / CSS file in an external memory and brought home.

Lee says, "Female students who participated in the project received hope for a bright future of technology". She said that female students felt that they were very suitable for pursuing knowledge of science. The point that the students do not understand was waiting for the volunteer staff to tell, but it seems that the students who were meeting for the first time also helped each other to advance the plan.


When asking the girls students "Want to advance to the field of computer science in the future?" In the questionnaire after the project, 30 people answered "Yes" for all 30 people. Before starting the project, Mr. Lee was worried that "female students younger than me are not interested in studying programming", but he seems to be relieved with the result of the questionnaire. Lee says, "Although it seems a small number of female students, it seems a small number, it will be a breakthrough to break the walls of the programming field of male society, and I want more women to come to the world of computer science." doing.