Why coding?

Max Forbes, a CODE4FUN alumnus, won the Northern Beaches Youth Volunteer of the Year award

We are very proud of Max Forbes, a CODE4FUN alumnus, who won the Northern Beaches Youth Volunteer of the Year award! As a CODE4FUN student, Max always has been showing his passion and dedication to coding and computer science. We’re absolutely thrilled to witness how he continues to pursue his passion, while generously sharing his knowledge with others. At Willoughby City Library, Max helps children in a free after school program to learn about coding, computer literacy and problem solving. Max’s dedication is not just inspiring; it’s a testament to the transformative power of education and mentorship. We couldn’t be prouder of his achievements and the positive impact he’s making in our community. Let’s applaud Max Forbes for his outstanding contributions and for being a shining example of how one individual’s passion can ignite the spark of curiosity in countless others!

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CODE4FUN students meet Australian of the year Michelle Simmons and learn about Quantum Computer

CODE4FUN students learn about Quantum Computing from Professor Michelle Simmons UNSW

A huge Thank You to the Australian of the year Michelle Simmons, Alison Taylor, Gabrielle Green and all the team at the Centre for Quantum Computation & Communication Technology UNSW for inviting CODE4FUN students to visit, learn and explore one of the best Quantum Computer Research Centres in the world.

What an exceptional opportunity the CQC2T Team gave our coding students to see potential future pathways with the coding skills they are learning now. No doubt that this hands-on experience of cutting-edge computer science and technology has widened our students’ understanding and inspired them toward the array of careers that are now open to them.

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CODE4FUN student Zander Cheng launches his first iPhone app on Apple App Store

 

Hi everyone, my name is Zander. I am 12 years old, and I have just launched my very first game on the Apple App Store. You can play it on your iPhone or iPad, it costs $1.49. The game is a 3D geometric puzzle with 20 levels, so I hope you enjoy solving it!

It had always been a dream of mine to put an app on the Apple App Store. I would play other mobile games such as Monument Valley and Minecraft and be inspired by these worlds that other developers had managed to create, wishing I could do the same. I came up with the concept of Slidez just over half a year ago. I was talking to my dad about an old board game he used to play that he really enjoyed. I thought it would be cool to develop my own game but for mobile devices. I was hoping to bring back the old memories of playing board games in a new way. I started experimenting with Unity and managed to get a little prototype working.

My 3D puzzle game is called “Slidez”. It has 20 levels with 2 different themes. At each level, a player has to move different blocks with a joystick to release one block to hit the gold block out. I also arranged and composed the music for this game.

The development of this game took much longer than expected because I encountered many bugs and had to research along the way in order to fix them properly. However, I know that what I learned from my experience will be useful in the future. In total, Slidez took about 6 months of work. I eventually got to a point where I could release the game. I was very excited at the thought of having a mobile game like the others I played when I was younger. However, it still had to pass Apple’s testing and lodgement program to get on the App Store. I sent in the application to Apple and two days later I found that my game had passed all the tests and had gone onto the App Store. I was very happy that I finally accomplished one of my dreams: I have been recognised by Apple as a Software Developer and I am authorised to develop further Apps for the App Store. 

My journey in programming started 5 years ago, when I joined CODE4FUN Scratch beginner class in Castle Hill. Since then I’ve completed four CODE4FUN coding courses: Scratch Beginner, Scratch Intermediate, Intro to Java and Java Pro, and currently I am studying Unity 3D and C# game development course in The Granville Centre. It’s been a long and exciting journey, and I would like to thank all CODE4FUN teachers for their support and knowledge they have given me over the years. 

If you want to check out my game, search “Slidez” in the Apple App Store or just click this link:

https://apps.apple.com/au/app/slidez/id1542413218#?platform=iphone

I hope you will enjoy playing it as much as I have enjoyed developing it.

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CODE4FUN Students Won Australian STEM Video Game Coding Challenge 2019

Such an amazing achievement by two CODE4FUN students Zoe and Andrei and their team from Balmain Public School in winning STEM Video Game Challenge 2019! They competed among others from all around Australia in Y5 – Y8 “Playable Game in Scratch” category.

We all are super proud of them and cannot help but share their success with all CODE4FUN community. Well done to Zoe, Andrei and the whole team! Your passion and commitment to coding and your achievement, is very inspirational.

Both Zoe and Andrei have been studying with CODE4FUN for over two years, starting from block-based Scratch all the way to Pro Level, learning text-based industry standard Java language now.

Here is the game, enjoy:

Pease click here to play: play the game

Once again, well done to Zoe, Andrei and the whole team!

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