The first time I introduced one of my classes to coding it was through this lesson and I have used it many times since then. It is a great for teaching about polygons and it is fantastic for introducing the basic concept of coding.

Lesson Outline:

• Explain to students that computers are dumb. They can’t do anything unless someone else tells them how to do it and what to do.  It is the people behind computers that are smart.
• Tell students that we will role play.  The teacher acts as the computer and the students are the programmers. Have the students give commands to tell the computer (teacher) how to draw a square on the whiteboard.
• Follow the students very literally. For example if they say draw a straight line but don’t tell you how long to draw it draw it until they tell you to stop.  Or if they say a command that is too long you can say “error”.
• Pair students up and have them practice the same activity with a partner.  Take turns being the computer and the programmer.
• Students reflect on what they learnt from this activity.

The follow up lesson to this is having students create polygons using code.

Worksheet for next lesson.

More unplugged coding activities from Code.org