Introduction
Lesson
Why Code Shrew?
- Python-based language – apply your new skills to a variety of projects!
- We’ll learn about different components of programming to help draw awesome designs
- Learn it, test it, challenge yourself – all free of charge!
How does it work?
- Lessons cover pieces of programming that are common in other languages – and then we apply it all to making great creations!
- Videos, text, and a playground is provided for each lesson
- Playground: different code templates to experiment with and apply what you learned in the lesson
- Challenges are also provided separately to test your skills and creativitiy!
- You are also able to draw freely, creating new designs and showing off your sweet new skills!
The Playground
- Code will be set up for you to experiment with. You change numbers, move lines around, whatever you want! This is your space to figure out the power, and limitations, of programming.
- Note you can restart code whenever you need to so don’t be shy! If you “break your code” (meaning it’s no longer working) and can’t figure out why, just reset and keep on truckin’!
- Fun coding fact: when you break your code, or when you just generally know there’s something not quite right about how your code is running, and have to find out what is wrong, the process of finding the root of the problem is called debugging! Shrews love bugs! Debugging is just part of the fun of programming and often when you learn the most.
Challenges
- These are to be completed at your own pace outside of the lessons.
- Challenges will show you a design or animation. Your task is to recreate it to the best of your ability!
- Some challenges can be completed early in the course, others may need to be completed later since you’ll need more complex skills in order to complete them.
- You can even create your own challenges to test the skills of others!
Documentation
Full documentation of Code Shrew can be found here. Don’t worry about understanding all the information there right now, just know it’s here for when you need it. We will look at documentation together as we proceed through lessons so you can see how documentation is a useful tool.