November 12, 2016

1. Open up your internet connection and connect to “Fiber Public WiFi“

2. Can’t connect? Raise your hand and a mentor will get you a hotspot to connect to.

3. We recommend using the Google Chrome browser.

If you don’t know which programming language to start learning, we recommend Scratch (if Scratch is not to your speed, check out the typing.io link in the sidebar on the right).

You will need a parent or guardian’s help to create a Scratch login:

1. Click “Join Scratch” in the upper right-hand corner of the Scratch site.
2. Create a username that does not include your real name.
3. Think of a password that you can remember easily. You should have your parent or guardian write this down and save it.
4. Click “Next” and continue following the directions. You will need a valid email address (yours or your guardian’s) to continue.

Once you have a Scratch login, use the links below to build something awesome.

1. Are you brand new to coding? Start with Codecademy (recommended for 13 years & up) or Scratch (recommended for 12 years & under).  Want to try building your own phone application? Check out App Inventor! Be sure to create an account and write down your username and password so you won’t forget!

2. Do you have a little coding under your belt? Are you ready to learn more? Check out these fun games:

• CodeAvengers – learn to build javascript apps
• CodeCombat -Learn how to code by playing a game
• CSS Diner -A game for learning CSS selectors
• Flexbox Froggy – A game for learning CSS flexbox
• Flexbox Defense – Another game for learning CSS flexbox
• Super Markup Man – learn html
• Untrusted – a user javascript adventure game

3. Were you working on a project from our last session? Feel free to continue on that, and ask mentors if you need any help!

4. Get started on the new project. We can’t wait to see what you create!

Mastery – Feeling masterful? Check out the requirements for our mastery badges. You can earn cool pins!

Today’s theme: Use Arrays (aka “Lists”) to make your own voting application

Today’s theme builds upon last month’s theme of making and using Arrays and Lists. Please feel free to revisit that lesson to remind yourself about just how awesome they are.

Today we’re going to make our own Voting application.

Concepts we’ll play with:

• Lists / Arrays
• Getting the length of an array
• Comparing the sizes of lists/arrays

Lists and arrays are basic data structures that hold just one type of thing. For instance, a spelling list contains only words that you are expected to spell properly for the spelling test, so you shouldn’t expect to find a math problem in that list. A list is also countable, which means that at any point in time, the list has a known number of items in it.

We will use lists to store registered users who have voted for a certain candidate. At any time, we can count how many users have voted for that candidate. In Scratch, this would look like: (length of [candidateA]). In JavaScript, this would look like [candidateA].length

We can also see if something is already in the list/array so we don’t add it again. In Scratch, this would look like: (candidateA contains "thing"?). In JavaScript, this would look like: [candidateA].indexOf("thing")

For today’s session, we want to see at least two things in order to be eligible for presenting to the group: adding items to at least one list/array and comparing the sizes of those lists/arrays (or variables). No politics, just have fun!

Example Project:

• Scratch: Fruit Salad Election

Did you create something awesome based off of one of these projects? Come present it on stage! Presentations will start at 11:00 am. Let a mentor know you want to show off your work. Scratch projects that will be presented will be added the CoderDojoKC Studio by Mentor Eric.

**Presentations may not contain any politics, violence, gore, or bad words. (And we’re counting “sucks” as a bad word!)