Coding for Kids vs. Adults: What's the Difference?

If you're a parent searching for ways to introduce coding for kids, you may wonder "What makes coding any different for kids versus adults?" At Let's Start Coding, we make coding kits specifically for kids 8-15 to get started with typed code. We've seen hundreds of coding products for kids over the past 10 years; here's what the best kids programming toys recognize:

Kids and adults come to coding with different motivations, expectations, and needs. They may need a different learning process and more obvious progress to keep going. 

Let's dive in to each of these differences between coding for kids vs. coding for adults:

Motivation

Adults may be driven to learn coding by a career change, a new need for their small business, or to better understand the technology they hear about on the news. Kids, on the other hand, are more driven by curiosity about what they can build and interest in creating their own games and electronics.

Think about taking up a new sport as an analogy. An adult starting a new sport often has a practical reason: better overall health, rehabilitating an injury, or making new connections. Kids, on the other hand, just want to try something new and have fun doing it! Luckily, this means most kids are open to learning coding even if it's totally new to them, as long as it seems fun.

Process 

An adult may research which coding language is the best to learn for their outcome and carefully consider the best path to success (a coding history book? A coding bootcamp? A private tutor?). Coding for kids, though, needs immediate feedback and quick wins to keep them engaged. Kids are less interested in learning about coding and more interested in doing coding.

Adults may be more interested in learning coding "the right way", while kids want to code "right now!". Especially when getting kids started coding, it's important to recognize they need to have some good early experiences to avoid getting bored or frustrated. 

Progress 

Adults can endure long and boring stretches on their code-learning journey if they have a solid end goal in mind, like a promotion at work or a new career. They may be able to power through months of boring work and failure to get to the end result. Good luck doing that with kids! Kids can surmount challenges and setbacks, but they need to have steady progress that is fun along the way to keep them engaged. 

For most kids around middle school age, keeping a long term goal in mind is tough, especially as their interests and goals change so quickly. When coding with kids, keep in mind that they may start coding, drift away from it, and return to it months later: that's totally normal. The important thing is that they are not turned off by their early experiences so that they never want to try it again.

Relevance

As we've mentioned, what's relevant to a kid learning coding can be very different than what is relevant to an adult. Do kids want to show their friends that they can get a search result from a database in 1 second instead of 10 seconds? Doubtful. Kids want to make something exciting. Kids' interests change quickly (sometimes with every new release of a video game!) and so it can be hard to pin down exactly what they'll like even next week. When searching for a coding toy for kids, try to find something that is creative and open-ended so that when the trend of the month dies down, they'll still be interested.

Why a Let's Start Coding Kit is Right for Kids Coding

Let's Start Coding kits for kids 8-15 have been designed from the ground up to give your kid a great experience as they start to learn typed code. Here's how we address each kid-specific need for coding kits.

Curiosity is the Motivation

Our kits are fun to look at, hold, and play with! We have integrated arcade-style clicky buttons, jumbo LED lights, turn knobs, and other physical, tangible electronics that make kids feel like they've gotten a cool coding gift, not another Zoom online assignment or homework. Every kit is pre-loaded with an example program so kids can have something working for them in seconds, fueling their curiosity. 

Hands-On Process

Once kids are hands-on with their kit, the first thing we invite them to do with our free online lessons is: code! No reading about the history of coding, no comparing the merits of one coding language over another - just coding cool projects! By getting hands-on with coding, kids are excited coders from the very first minute, and the rest will follow. 

Steady Progress

Kids need many smaller wins to keep them engaged and interested to keep going. The Let's Start Coding kit projects are "bite-sized", so that kids can get familiar with the example code and then code their first experiment within 15 minutes. If the coding project involves blinking two LED lights, for example, kids can very quickly start changing the speed of the blinks or the colors of the LEDs. Even these small wins are progress on kids' coding journey. Our projects also include challenges for kids, so they can get 5 or more steps of progress with every project and stay engaged with their coding.

Customizable for Relevance

The more a kid can customize their code and their gadget, the more relevant it will be to them. We love to see kids code their favorite theme song on Piano Jumbo or make all of the LEDs from Code Lab into their favorite color. Whether it's a temperature alarm (Ultimate Kit) or a rocket laser sound effect (Code Rocket), kids are customizing electronic gadgets - what could be more relevant than that? 

If you want to bring coding to your kids, we hope you'll take a look at our hundreds of free online code projects and hands-on electronic coding kits!

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About Let’s Start Coding

Let’s Start Coding builds hands-on kits that teach typed coding for kids. Learners download free desktop software that includes step-by-step projects, code walkthroughs, and challenges. As kids complete challenges, they learn about fundamentals of typed code, like variables, functions, and loops. Most importantly, they're having fun building tangible electronic projects. Kids and parents can use the kits at home with an internet-connected Windows, Mac, or Chromebook computer.