Almost one year ago I stood up in-front of a bunch of people and said “We learn to code badly”, and uneventfully went back to my day job.

More recently, by accident and mostly luck, I stumbled into an opportunity I wasn’t sure existed—Write code to help people learn through play. I’ll be working at Code Club: A worldwide network of coding clubs for children aged 9–11.

It isn’t going to be glamorous code filled with algorithmic delight. Not even close to code from the book, and I might have to commit horrors that would even make Notch wince. That’s ok—I’m not trying to solve technical problems, but social ones.

My goal is not to teach undergraduate computer science, but to help bring about algorithmic literacy. I believe the most basic computer interaction is in some way programming—providing a set of instructions for it to follow—but programming at its best is expressing new concepts and ideas that aren’t already there.

“Dude, Sucking at something is the first step to being sorta good at something”

Let’s face it: I’m not going to get it right first time. I’m not Jean Piaget or Seymour Papert, but hopefully I can inspire someone younger to play with code, and even perhaps fix my code too. I’m not expecting every child to turn into John Carmack, but to understand that they can use the computer as playground for their own ideas.