Minecraft Fan Jack Gives Advice To Other Coders!

Jack Williamson is in 4th grade and lives in Kansas City. When he’s not coding, he’s playing outside, using Minecraft, climbing, playing on the iPad, or at Cub Scouts. We talked to him to learn more about him, and why he loves to code!

What do you want to be when you grow up? Maybe a video game designer.

How did you get introduced to Tynker? This year in school my teacher said the Tynker app was free, so we got that and it’s been fun to do since. I would say I usually work at school. I do most of the coding at school and then draw the rest, like drawing the little things for the house.

What is your favorite thing you’ve made? Probably Space Invaders.

Do your friends Tynker? Do you ever Tynker with your friends? Yeah. We work together at school, so everyone will make their own thing and then we’ll share coding. If we need help we’ll help each other.

Do you look at the Tynker community projects? I look at the ones on the app! I like messing around with other things, trying to improve them.

What’s your favorite feature in Tynker? The broadcast feature! You can just put broadcast and then when I receive it helps to carry things around from code to code.

Why do you like to code? It’s just fun to make a game that actually will work. I like messing around with stuff on the iPad like I said earlier, so it’s fun to try to make it work.

Do you think other kids should try coding? Yes. It helps with development because you can think: if this happens, then maybe I can get this to happen too. You think about how stuff works. When you’re playing a game or something you think, “Maybe I could do that!” For example, I think about how pistons extend. Sorry, I’m getting too Minecraft-y!

What advice would you give for kids starting out with Tynker? Try to start with something easy. Go to community projects and look at them to see how they work. Then you could start building your own things after that, but you should start simple and work your way up.

John, Jack’s dad, thinks learning to code helps Jack think logically. For him, coding encourages one to “work within the constraints, but still be creative.” He likes seeing Jack combine his creativity with logic to make games and build on Minecraft.

Thanks for your time, John and Jack. You gave some great advice Jack, and we hope you continue to enjoy Tynkering with your friends!