It’s no secret that the digital landscape has taken the world by storm, be it the vast knowledge offered online or the influence brought upon by social media. Beneath it all lies a foundation of computer science, a rapidly growing career path and STEM field (science, technology, engineering and math) that children enjoy. Take it from Marie Rotter of Code Ninjas, an after-school coding academy for children in kindergarten through eighth grade.
The main program at Code Ninjas, Create, is a drop-in program with no scheduled class times. This is helpful for working parents with hectic schedules that can’t fit into set time slots, as it can be stressful rushing to drop your children off at a specific time. Instead, children simply walk in and scan their membership wristband which correlates with their “belt,” log into their computer, and start their hour or two-hour long coding session. Much like a karate or taekwondo dojo, Code Ninjas identifies student “ranks” according to the belts that they hold with beginners starting with a white wristband.
Throughout the Create program, children are encouraged to code through gamified education. In other words, Code Ninjas uses video games to teach children how to build their own video games in Java, C# and Unity once they reach higher belts. The entire program takes between four and four and a half years to complete and serves as a foundational coding education. Eventually, students reach the Black Belt Program which requires them to build and launch their own game in the iOS app store, with their finished products available for parents to experience through an online portal.
Code Ninjas offers monthly memberships and weekly packages of one or two hours, with the two-hour package being the most popular. They also hold 10 different themed camps based on Minecraft, Roblox, stop-motion animation, and even a Become a YouTuber camp, plus a number of social events from summer camps and birthday parties to Parent’s Night Out on Fridays.
It’s a unique exploratory experience for children, because, unlike most tutoring centers, students genuinely enjoy attending. According to Marie Rotter, a franchisee who opened her own location off Wadsworth Boulevard at the end of 2019, “They don’t have to choose between being creative and learning something that will help them with their future career. They can do both with coding.”
Visit the website for more information at codeninjas.com, or call Marie’s Arvada office at (720) 432-2799 to get your children’s coding education off on the right foot.
Some photos courtesy of Code Ninjas Arvada