B.C. schoolchildren soon to be taught computer coding

Mandatory code courses will begin rolling out within the B.C. public school system in September.

Photograph by: Chris Young , THE CANADIAN PRESS

An announcement declaring that B.C. schoolchildren will soon be taught computer coding has been met with concerns that teachers lack the training to teach the skills and schools don't have the required technology.

Premier Christy Clark said Monday the mandatory courses would be phased in to classrooms over three years, beginning in September.

"And it is my goal to make sure that it doesn't just become an opportunity for every child to take part in, but we ultimately make it mandatory for every child from kindergarten to Grade 12 to learn what coding is and how it works," Clark said in a speech to the #BCTECH Summit in Vancouver.

Teachers, academics and technology leaders welcomed the move, saying it could help young children learn different methods for problem solving and mathematics, while also giving them skills for future jobs.

Approximately 120,000 people work in the technology sector or in tech-related jobs in B.C., with wages 60-per-cent higher than the average rate.

But the news was greeted with concern that B.C.'s teachers may lack the training to properly teach coding, and districts may lack the money to upgrade aging computer labs and Internet bandwidth in order to give students the right technological tools.

Putting coding in the curriculum is "long overdue" and research has shown the benefits for decades through improvements to critical thinking, processing information, problem solving and inspiring curiosity, said Marina Milner-Bolotin, an assistant professor in the University of B.C.'s faculty of education.

"It has been well known that coding has not been for the sake of becoming programmers, but for the sake of learning how to think," she said.

The government said it's not until Grade 9 when students would begin using languages such as HTML, Java or C++. Younger kids would learn through "exploratory and purposeful play" as well as a focus on computational thinking, algorithms, binary number systems and robotics.

"Coding is a nice buzzword to put out for the media," said Jon Hamlin, a computer science teacher at Pinetree secondary school in Coquitlam, vice-president of Computer Using Educators of BC (CUEBC), an association under the BCTF, and co-author of the draft curriculum for kindergarten to Grade 9. Those will be the first grades to have the new curriculum, with Grades 10 to 12 to be added in September 2017. "It is really the early development of computational thinking skills."

Such curriculum doesn't involve using computers, which are in short or outdated supply in many schools, nor does it require that teachers know how to code.

"I want to calm fears and anxiety around the deployment," said Hamlin. "There are a lot of people worried: 'How are we supposed to do this when we don't have the technology and we don't have the training ourselves?'"

Jim Iker, president of the B.C. Teachers' Federation, does have concerns. He said teachers need better training and more government funding to do the work, while schools need better equipment.

"We know how quickly technology changes. We've got schools that have computer labs where half the computers right now are not functioning properly," he said.

But there's no additional money coming from the province, said Education Minister Mike Bernier. Coding is only one part of larger changes to the school curriculum announced last year, which Bernier said came with $1 million and six new teacher professional development days over three years.

He also brushed aside money for new computer hardware, iPads or software.

"You don't actually have to be sitting in front of a computer to learn coding," he said. "There's lots of different ways to do that."

The government will make it a priority to upgrade Internet connections to schools, said Bernier. Some schools in northern or remote areas lack speedy access or robust Internet bandwidth.

School districts can choose to upgrade computers or buy new gear within their existing budgets, said the minister.

That's yet another pressure upon school districts, many of which have already had to cut operating budgets, said Mike Lombardi, chairman of the Vancouver school board.

"The bottom line is if you introduce any new curriculum in the schools, the research shows very clearly you need to provide the learning resources and in-service time and training to enable teachers to utilize and understand that in the classroom," he said.

Melody Ma, a Vancouver web developer and volunteer lead for Hour of Code and Code Create, events aimed at introducing students to coding, said while she welcomes the idea, it is short on details on how the new curriculum will be implemented.

"There are schools without the equipment to actually be able to execute this," she said. "There are communities that only have dial-up (Internet)."

"There are so many fundamental problems and issues, basic things like getting Internet to kids, getting them the infrastructure. What are the plans to resolve those issues before we start talking about reaching that ultimate goal: to get every kid to learn to code?"

Tech companies who face intense competition in attracting talent say introducing coding to the curriculum is important to help educate students for jobs of the future.

"Computer science skills, such as coding, are increasingly critical as technology is where all future job growth lies," said Jeff Booth, co-founder and CEO of Vancouver's BuildDirect.

"We need to set our kids up for success if they are going to thrive in the modern world. It's very possible that computer coding and other technology skills may become as critical as reading and writing."

Alexandra Greenhill was vice-chair of the Conseil Scolaire Francophone de la Colombie Britannique when that school board gave every child from Grade 4-12 a laptop, but she said she wanted to see computer education at an even younger age.

"My argument was you needed to start earlier than that if you are really going to make them literate in that language, not as a second language but fluent," said Greenhill, a physician, founder and CEO of myBestHelper and co-creator of Little Codr, a card game to introduce toddlers and young children to basic concepts of coding.

"I'm thrilled that the ministry decided to take an approach, to say this is the standard we expect," she said.

Coding in classrooms has taken off in some other provinces, including New Brunswick, which announced $400,000 in funding last year to put tech labs in each school.

David Alston co-founded Brilliantlabs.ca, an initiative launched by that province's government as part of its push to add tech education to the school curriculum.

While Alston commended Clark's announcement, he questioned how it would be worked out.

"What does that mean, what resources is it going to take, how are they going to train the teachers?," he asked. "This is just step one of 100 but it is an important step."

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