Let’s Get Coding

These are coding languages commonly used in schools across the world. This book is an introduction to computer programming using the most useful (and free) programs available, combined with the new inspiration and excitement of micro computing available right now! It is an introduction to more complex computing at grade 4 level upwards. At home the purchase of a raspberry pi will enable all of these programs to run without any installation as SCRATCH and PYTHON is available on all versions of the micro computer. SNAP! is best suited for larger laptops or desktop computers and is almost identical to SCRATCH, but it has an advantage of being a very good alternative for laptop or desktops. It’s also entirely cloud based, so no installation required. PYTHON requires an IDE to work. The one we use is called THONNY (which is also installed on the raspberry pi micro computer). Available for Mac/PC and Linux. The author has made these programs ‘cross-platform’ and has used standard SCRATCH ‘blocks’ and Python code that can be used on any (Mac/PC/Linux) computer with Python 3. Each page is self-contained, with notes followed by a Python example.