Cabinet Secretary for Education Kirsty Williams has announced today a £1.3 Million investment to support the plan ‘Cracking the Code’ which aims to expand and support computer coding across Wales. Ms Williams said: 

‘Today I am pleased to launch ‘Cracking the Code – a plan to expand code clubs in every part of Wales.’  The plan sets out how Welsh Government will work in partnership with schools, colleges, consortia, universities, businesses, industry and the third sector to support the teaching of coding skills both in and outside of the classroom in local areas across Wales.’

The Minister goes on to outline the strategic actions the plan:

‘To support the delivery of Cracking the Code we will work collectively with our partners to achieve improved learning on code under three strategic actions:

Raise awareness and highlight the benefits of code clubs to headteachers, teachers, learners and parents.

Break down the barriers to participation in code clubs.

Broker and facilitate coding experiences.’

Ms Williams made the announcement of the plan at Llandough Primary school in the Vale of Glamorgan where Technocamps were delivering coding Workshops to Year 2 and Year 4 pupils. Technocamps have been working closely with Llandough Primary School for the past year visiting the school regularly each term, delivering Workshops to all year groups from Reception to Year 6 on a variety of programming and computational thinking topics. The Workshops have helped the pupils and staff develop their programming skills, and knowledge of computational thinking, as well as meet many aspects of the Digital Literacy Framework. Workshops have included: Scratch Jr and Scratch Programming; KODU Game Development; and Unplugged Computing Workshops looking at algorithms and pseudocode. 

Hayley Brady, Deputy Head at the school said, 

“Working with Technocamps had been invaluable for teachers and pupils at Llandough; Technocamps staff have allowed us to develop and improve the pupils’ programming skills and confidence in using computers and other hardware, as well as supporting the staff to cover key areas of the DCF.” 

Technocamps are pleased to be working in partnership with the Welsh Government and other partners across Wales to realise the aims and objectives of this plan.

You can find more information about the ‘Cracking the Code’ plan here.