Dubai News at your Fingertips!
Related Articles
Dubai, United Arab Emirates – 16 December 2015: Cartoon Network Arabic, the leading children’s channel in the Middle East, has launched the Hour of Code campaign, as part of its partnership with Code.org to raise awareness and inspire children to get involved in computer science, specifically computer coding. Supported by du, the competition is in line with Hour of Code, a global movement aimed at engaging with millions of students across 180 countries.
The dedicated online portal www.CartoonNetworkArabic.com/hourofcode provides resources in English and Arabic to support teachers or individuals to organize an Hour of Code event in their own schools or even at home. The competition will be introduced through a roadshow across 40 schools in Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Sharjah, during which Cartoon Network Arabic will present the portal to teachers and their students in an effort to encourage their participation. The teachers and students can then log on, join the movement and begin the hour-long training session.
Cartoon Network Arabic will be awarding the top three schools with the highest number of participants.
Tarek Mounir, General Manager MENA, Turkey, Greece and Cyprus at Turner Broadcasting comments: “Coding lessons are becoming increasingly popular across the globe, introducing the “new universal language” to children as young as four years old will play a role in changing the future generation. In the UAE, the discussion to introduce coding as an additional subject for primary school students has been gaining traction as the country’s vision to build a knowledge-based economy and drive innovation sits high on its agenda. The introduction of coding at an early age will help encourage innovation in the advancement of technology and create a new generation of high-skilled progressive thinkers.”
Samer Geissah, Vice President – Consumer New Business and Innovation at du said: “Today’s children are tomorrow’s leaders and with so many technological advancements around us, it is important to inculcate scientific temper in young impressionable minds. Coding is not only a wonderful way to nurture creativity but its knowledge would prove to have practical uses as well. Our collaboration with Cartoon Network Arabic in the Hour of Code campaign comes at the right time as part of our ongoing efforts to usher in a digital transformation that keeps the UAE at the forefront of innovation.”
“Partnering with Cartoon Network Arabic, we hope to inspire the children of tomorrow, their parents and their teachers, that today’s kids can learn not only to use the technology of the future, but to understand how it works and build it themselves,” says Code.org co-Founder Hadi Partovi.
Code.org launched in 2013 with the aim to expand participation in computer science by making it available in more schools. The organization believes that computer science and programming should be part of the core curriculum in education, alongside other science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) courses. It offers tutorials introducing core concepts in a fun and entertaining manner. These are game-like, self-directed coding tutorials starring video lectures by industry giants such as Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg. The aim is to show that it is much easier to learn to program than you might think and to inspire children to further explore and gain a better understanding of computer science and programming. Since its launch, over 100 million students have tried its Hour of Code programs and 200,000 classrooms have used the intro course.
