Course Guideline

1. Courses for younger students with little to no programming experience

   These are visual programming languages where you drag and drop blocks and connect them together to form your program. This is the best way to learn coding as it focuses on the logic, problem solving and critical thinking skills without getting hampered on typing and syntax. It provides quick feedback and results to encourage and keep your child engaged.

   Rather than taking the entire series in order, we encourage you to take a few classes of each category and then move up to the next level over the years. Otherwise, the abstraction and the math might require concepts that they may not have learned in school yet.

   • Scratch - Create your own animation, story or game using this very popular visual programming language by MIT. At WhizKidz, there are five courses with the first two covering the basics of coding. The next three are Scratch Games, Scratch and Math Puzzles, and Scratch Multiplayer Projects that pushes Scratch to its limits! These are intermediate level courses which can be taken in any order.
   • MIT App Inventor - Create Android mobile apps using the Blockly language created by Google. This is a five-course series that covers the programming fundamentals, the various sensors on your phone/tablet, and integration with different databases and storage. By the fourth or fifth course, we encourage your child to publish an app on the Play store!
   • Minecraft Modding with EpicMC Modly - Use the Blockly language to build Minecraft mods (short for modification) on WhizKidz's own unique platform that is open to the public! Build fancy structures with a single click. Give yourself superpowers. Create cool minigames or games inside of Minecraft. You will learn to think in 3D and to develop multiplayer games! The underlying language is JavaScript so you will be learning this language without realizing it!
   • LEGO robotics - There are two series of LEGO at WhizKidz. LEGO WeDo takes simple building and programming and blends it with science. LEGO EV3 is the gold standard for robotics for 9 to 14 years old. The LEGO EV3 courses provide the background necessary to compete in the wildly popular FLL (First LEGO League) tournaments held each year.

2. Courses for students ready to learn a traditional programming language

   WhizKidz has an entire series of classes for each of these languages so you can work your way from the start to become an expert.

   • Web Dev (HTML/CSS/JavaScript) - Create dynamic web sites using HTML, CSS and JavaScript. JavaScript is one of the most popular languages in use today. The Web Dev series consists of the two courses in HTML and CSS (Web Dev 1 and Web Dev 2) followed by three courses in JavaScript (JavaScript 1, 2 and 3).
   • Python - Python is used in the real-world for building test infrastructure, internal scripts, and standalone and web applications. It is also used by a number of high profile applications such as OpenStack, Dropbox and Blender. The Python series consists of two basic courses, Python Programming 1 and 2, also called Python Workshops during the summer, and then Intermediate Python 1, 2 and 3. Python is the leader in machine learning with its wealth of library support, having overtaken the R language. WhizKidz also has a mini-series on Python and Machine Learning.
   • Java - Java is one of the top languages used by enterprises for building large web applications and standalone applications. The AP Computer Science A exam, where you can earn college credits for passing this exam, is based on Java and object-oriented programming. The Java series consists of two basic courses, Java Programming 1 and 2, also called Java Workshops during the summer, and three intermediate courses named AP Java 1, 2 and 3. The name simply denotes that this series will cover all relevant topics included in the AP Computer Science exam. WhizKidz offers an AP Computer Science A Prep course dedicated to preparing you for the exam after you have completed the Java series.
   • PHP - PHP is by far, the most widely used language for building web sites, with a commanding lead of almost 80%! It is primarily what Facebook and Yahoo originally used to develop their web sites. The PHP series consists of five courses, Modern PHP Programming 1 and 2, and intermediate courses that cover MVC (Model-View-Controller) paradigm, integration with a relational database, and use of the #1 PHP framework called Laravel.

3. Courses for students interested in robotics and electronics

   • Robotics - WhizKidz has a wide range of robotic courses that start at elementary school all the way up to high school. The series for these are LEGO WeDo, LEGO EV3, mBot, VEX EDR and even a DIY robot! See above for more information on the LEGO classes.
   • Raspberry Pi - Use this computer on a card to connect to the outside world with various sensors. This class primarily uses Python. Although knowing Python is definitely helpful, it is not a required prerequisite.
   • Arduino - Use this microcontroller to learn about electronics and connect to the outside world with various sensors. These courses use C to program the controller. Knowledge of C is not a prerequisite for these courses.