We have been running our Year 6 Coding Club ever since we went into lockdown and we even met once a week during the school holidays. So far, we have built electronic traffic lights, burglar alarms with PIR sensors and then worked on making battery powered remote projects.
Our latest project has brought all those skills together to make a Covid-19 social isolation detector. Working remotely with Mr Friendship, the girls have wired up an ultrasonic distance measurer with buzzers and LEDs. We have then written the code to make the system work and made the whole thing mobile. If anyone comes within a 2m bubble of the Covid-19 detector the alarm goes off.
The level of coding that these Year 6 students are working with is way beyond GCSE and probably more like A-level or beyond. They have built these devices working entirely remotely using Teams and the achievement is staggering.
The code they are writing in is called C++ and is used in Industry to program embedded systems like the computers in your car, dishwasher, sat nav or smart TV. C++ is not taught in school at all as it is considered too tricky. Despite that, the girls have managed to build multiple projects regardless of lockdown!
