Why My Child Is Learning to Code

Why My Child Is Learning to Code

Over the past few months, we’ve talked to dozens of parents whose children are learning to code with Tynker. Over and over again, we heard the same concern: My children spend so much time staring at screens. How do I make their screentime more creative and productive? For these parents, this was one of the many problems that Tynker addressed. Here’s what they see as the benefits of coding for their children:

1. Coding strengthens logical and organizational skills

“One of the things [Benji] was having a problem with was math, so having to do the math involved in making a game and adding a score, multiplying for points, and different things like that, I think it’s helped him a lot.”
—Thomas, father of 11-year-old Benji

2. Building creative games builds confidence

“[Lindsay] shows us her projects a lot. She always gets really excited when she completes a project.”
—Nicole, mother of 11-year-old Lindsay

3. Coding is a creative outlet

“[Coding is] the language of creativity. [My kids] actually don’t have a lot of screen time, and the only time we allow them to have screen time is if they’re doing something creative. They’re very driven to not just watch things, but do something creative.”
—Emily, mother of 4th grader Julian

“He’s been so creative from an early age and mixing in some programming and coding seems to be right up his alley!”
—Mandy, mother of 5th grader Hayden

4. Exposure to coding can break down barriers

“I don’t want [my three daughters] to be constrained by this being a male-dominated field. They’ve got a lot of aptitude in science and technology, so I’m trying to give them exposure to that, see if they’ve got passion for it or not. Not force them to go down that route or anything, but give them exposure to different options and lots of choices.”
—Steve, father of 12-year-old Kareyn and 11-year-old Katrina

5. Coding allows kids to become makers of technology instead of consumers

“I love [seeing Brenda’s projects] because she’s not just playing somebody else’s game. She gets to create with her own imagination, so it’s really good.”
—Misty, mother of 9-year-old Brenda

“[My husband and I are] very anti-screen time, so we don’t like the kids just watching TV, but this kind of activity is something [Max] can do where he’s actually being productive, so I think it’s great. There’s a difference between passively just absorbing something and then actively engaging with it. I think coding is great on that end too.”
—Stephanie, mother of 11-year-old Max

“Kids these days want to spend all their time on the iPad anyway, so you might as well push them to do something more productive with that time.”
—Sam, father of 11-year-old Lindsay

6. Learning to code opens up job opportunities

“Whatever path he chooses to go down, I think [coding] will be helpful to him.”
—Cheri, mother of 11-year-old Ryan

“I always see that [my children] play but I tell them all the time, ‘Why are you just playing? Why don’t you try to learn something that you can use later on? Why don’t you try to make a program?’ I asked him, ‘What do you want to be?’ and he said, ‘I want to be an engineer.’ So I said, ‘You need to know what you need to do to be an engineer.'”
—Marcos, father of 10-year-old Christopher

7. Coding is a great boredom buster

“[Ryan’s] always been a kid where you constantly have to have something that he’s channeling his energy to. Basically if he’s not doing schoolwork or doing cooking or doing Boy Scouts, he’s on the computer coding something.”
—Cheri, mother of 11-year-old Ryan

8. Tynker provides a safe online creation environment

“What I like about Tynker is that, as a parent, I feel safe that my kid is in a program that is exactly for kids that she can play, she can use her imagination, she can learn new stuff. When [Dea] says, ‘I’m in Tynker,’ I know I feel safe. It’s the only thing we let her play on the computer.”
—Alida, mother of 7-year-old Dea

 9. Learning with a block-based language is the best transition to text-based coding

“In [Julian’s] school, the teacher recently introduced Python, and he really excelled. I feel like Tynker really helped him understand the logic behind the code, so he was able to learn [Python] much faster.”
—Emily, mother of 4th grader Julian

Has your child started coding yet? It’s not too late for your child to reap the intellectual and creative benefits of coding!

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