In the last few days of the semester, Oxford Day Academy participated in Google’s Hour of Code. Fourteen members of the Google team spent the day on our campus to serve as guides and collaborators as our students navigated various programming challenges. Read on to hear their perspective on the experience and, on behalf of everyone at Oxford Day Academy, we wish you a very Happy New Year!
Google Hour of Code
A collective piece from ODA students
Before all 100 of Oxford Day Academy students started the Hour of Code, 14 Google workers showed us an introduction video explaining what, and how, we were going to work during the ’Hour Code’ project. There was one Google worker at each table to help in case anyone needed assistance. They made sure we weren’t struggling with the lesson. Our assignment was to order the avatars to dance, change their positions, location and backgrounds, and to add music using codes in a sequence. The website we used had a section on the right side of the screen that had the codes to choose from. The students were able to play around with it and learn different ways of commanding the avatar. At the end of our session, and after completing the entire task, we received a certificate and a swag bag filled with useful goodies. We learned that coding is enjoyable and not as complex as we thought it would be. Special thanks to our English teacher, Ms. McMillion, and Esther from Google for this fantastic opportunity!