Taking programming classes for middle school students is important because the competitive job market offers more and more job opportunities for people who know how to code. If you want to learn about the best options for programming classes, reading about them online can be a great start. To find a free class, you can visit a few sites where teachers offer a coding course for free. Are you looking for a self-paced course or an instructor-led one? Are you looking for courses that have a .com tutorial style, or do you want an open source software platform? These are just a few things to look into as you explore options online
The coding tutor middle school can help you to learn not only about the free coding classes for middle school students, but also the best online coding courses.
Code.org
Code.org is a national nonprofit founded by tech entrepreneur Hadi Partovi that promotes access to coding education for everyone. The organization offers free in-person workshops for K–12 educators, as well as online training and tutorials.
The courses for K–5 teachers take six to eight hours to complete and provide a curriculum guide and lesson plans. Educators learn how to teach computer science fundamentals as a stand-alone course or ways to integrate coding instruction into other disciplines. There is no cost for attendance.
Middle and high school educators can attend summer workshops and follow up with in-person sessions throughout the year. The courses are free, and scholarships are available to cover travel expenses. Search the map for courses near you or contact a regional partner for upcoming opportunities.
No prior experience is required for any of the Code.org programs. According to founder Hadi Partovi, teachers do not need prior knowledge of math or computer programming. The programs are designed for any educator who wants to learn more about coding instruction.
Code.org also offers Hour of Code, an initiative that provides one-hour, self-guided tutorials educators can use to give students exposure to coding. The tutorials are free and available for any grade level. Nationally, Hour of Code is held during Computer Science Education week in early December, but teachers can access the materials and lead the activity anytime throughout the year. Edutopia has a guide that offers suggestions on how to make the most of Hour of Code.
App Inventor
Ages: 13+
Pricing: Free
App Inventor is a visual, blocks language for building Android Apps. Their coding website for kids features video tutorials and courses in a box.
Originally created by Google, App Inventor makes it possible to program Android apps just by moving objects around the screen. This approach is similar to block-based programming. The course begins with setting up App Inventor and moves through building progressively more complex Android apps. Students learn how to build mobile apps and share them using App Inventor. It’s educational, easy, and fun.
MIT now hosts App Inventor online, so, lucky for us, it available for free. The tutorials have been refined for use by teachers and gathered into a Course-in-a-Box that includes video and text-based lessons. Instead of keeping your kids off the phone, App Inventor will help kids go inside the phone.
Code Avengers
Ages: 12+
Pricing: A limited-time free trial or a monthly subscription is available.
Code Avengers is a coding website for kids that uses self-paced, mostly text-based courses. The courses include introduction to coding, introduction to web development, and coding in Python, HTML & CSS, or JavaScript.
Kids work through the lessons, debugging code, and completing challenges before. Code Avengers will automatically track your child’s achievements as they work through lessons and activities. They give you a Parent Dashboard, where you can view your children’s progress through the courses, the projects they’ve created, and the concepts they’ve learned.
When they hit a snag, kids have access to online support and technical support. This live help can be lacking in many other self-paced programs.
Code Monster
Ages: 13+
Pricing: Free
Code Monster is an interactive game that gives kids a place to practice writing JavaScript. From the moment you get to the site, you will be coding. Code Monster assumes that the student already knows some JavaScript and just needs a place to practice syntax.
All you have to do is follow the monster’s instructions on this coding website for kids, but there is little help otherwise. There’s a How to Play page, About page, and a FAQ. That’s it. The FAQ encourages the student to search for JavaScript tutorials and textbooks elsewhere.
The purpose of Code Monster is to provide a fun, immersive platform to practice, not necessarily learn, syntax.
Your child can learn to code from home.
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GameBlox
Ages: 13+
Pricing: Free
GameBlox is a block-based programming site for making games online for web and mobile devices. It allows anyone to develop games that you can play online and on your mobile phone.
You can use their starter projects as a base and make them more fun or use the “Make a Game” button to go straight to the code editing screen. This coding website for kids offers five getting started tutorials, but that’s all you need. There is an online forum on the site where questions can be posted and some video tutorials on YouTube.
The games students make can be played online at the GameBlox site or on a mobile device using the GameBlox app. If your child is mainly interested in game development, try starting here.
Codemoji
Ages: 5-13
Pricing: Free trial. Tiered annual subscriptions.
Codemoji uses images to teach coding and they’ve developed their platform with a deep belief that typing proficiency is not required to code. Students formulate solutions and learn to problem solve using images, so kids as young as 5 can build basic coding skills with Codemoji.
Lightbot
Ages: All ages
Pricing: Free trial. Monthly and annual subscriptions.
LightBot lets kids solve puzzles using programming. It’s a puzzle game, based on coding, that secretly teaches you programming logic as you play.
Kids will learn sequencing, overloading, procedures, recursive loops, and conditionals without feeling like they’re learning. The games revolve around a robot and blocks, similar to the popular game Minecraft. LightBot was designed with first-time coders in mind, so it’s simple for beginners.
Glitch
Ages: 13+
Pricing: Free
Glitch is a simple tool for creating web apps. They’re evolving and simplifying developer tools, making it ideal for older kids who are learning to code. Coding on Glitch is like working together in Google Docs–multiple people can work on the same project at the same time. There’s no setup, and you can see changes live on the web as you type. Students can use simple, yet powerful tools to build their website and remix projects from real-world languages and frameworks.
Kids can work collaboratively on projects or on a team. It’s easy and fun to express yourself in code on Glitch. Not only that, they have a community of developers at all levels to support their learning.
Students don’t have to worry about fussing with servers and setup. They can now create industry-standard code from start to finish.
Conclusion
These coding courses for middle school students will keep your children f in with their studies. With education options available for many different levels of expertise, the following sites provide free coding for middle school students in HTML5, Python, Java, and Javascript.