Code Ninjas

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Code Ninjas is a for-profit educational organization specializing in teaching coding to kids, and is the largest kids coding franchise in the world with over 400 locations open and operating in three countries. [1] It is headquartered in Pearland, Texas. [2] It was founded by David Graham in 2016, inspired by watching his son learn Tae Kwon Do. [3] It has locations in the United States, Canada, and United Kingdom.

Contents

Structure

Code Ninjas buildings are separated into classrooms and lobbies. The lobbies are for parents to pick up and drop off their kids and have free Wi-Fi, refreshments, and games or toys for the kids to play with while on break or waiting for their parents. Meanwhile, the classrooms (referred to as dojos) have small desks and are restricted for only Code Senseis (the educators), and Ninjas (the students), aged 7–14, who are given laptops to do programming. Each of the kids start out at white belt, and work their way up the "Path of Enlightenment" to Black Belt. [4] In the "Create" program, different belts have different coding languages. For example, white, yellow, orange, and green belts learn JavaScript. Impact, the latest curriculum launched around May 2023 is structured around Microsoft Make Code Arcade a system that allows for text (JavaScript) or block based coding, their previous program utilized a Konva based game engine, blue belts would learn LuaU, Roblox's own version of Lua. Purple, brown, red, and black belts learn C# with Unity. [4] In black belt, the ninjas are directed to create their own game through the Unity platform. These games are then approved and uploaded to the code ninjas website. Throughout the curriculum, ninjas learn about computer science concepts such as control flow, object-oriented programming, and many other common programming concepts.

Belts

Code Ninjas operates on a belt system, similar to karate. Ninjas begin at white belt, then progressing to yellow belt, orange belt, green belt, blue belt, purple belt, brown belt, red belt, and finally, black belt. Each belt has its own curriculum and each belt usually uses different coding programs and types of coding. Each belt progressively gets harder and difficulty, white belt being the easiest and black belt being the hardest. Although belts were originally represented through physicals electronic wristbands which would allow the ninja to "scan into" the dojo, Code Ninjas now does not supply physical bands and instead digitally keeps track of the ninjas' accomplished belts.

Summer Camps

During the summer, Code Ninjas offers camps alongside normal classes, where the parents drop their children off for a half-day summer class during the weekdays, either in the morning or in the afternoon. The content of these camps mainly focuses on programming skills, usually coding or other game development aspects in either Minecraft or Roblox; however, other camps such as becoming a YouTuber [5] focus on improving students' computing abilities through other means. Other summer camps offered by Code Ninjas include: 3D design and print with Tinkercad, 3D animation with Blender as well as various Python camps.

Controversy

Some students are outraged at changes to curriculum, such as different white and yellow belts and the removal of Python. [6] [ citation needed ]

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References

  1. ↑ "Code Ninjas, Our Story". Code Ninjas. Archived from the original on 2018-10-05.
  2. ↑ "Contact Us". Code Ninjas. Archived from the original on 2012-09-17.
  3. ↑ "Cultivating the next generation of coders- ninja style". Microsoft News. Archived from the original on 2019-05-19.
  4. 1 2 "Code Ninjas Create". forms.codeninjas.com. Retrieved 2022-11-04.
  5. ↑ "Coding Camps For Kids: Year Round & Summer Camps". Code Ninjas. Retrieved 2022-11-04.
  6. ↑ "Code Ninjas Unveils New Curriculum, Other Major Developments at First Annual Ninjacon Conference". prnewswire. Aug 27, 2018. Retrieved Jan 5, 2024.
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