New Tech Kids | prototyping

16 mei 2019

Today’s teaching experiences at the Beatrix School in Haarlem

NewTechKids spent the day in beautiful Haarlem, teaching students at the Beatrixschool. Our challenge: teaching students in two classes about programming in the context of automation with LEGO Mindstorms robots. One class developed appliances aimed at reducing the workload of families while the other reimagined robots who could take over monotonous or dangerous farm work. While one-off classes aren't our preferences, these classes serve an important purpose. They allow us to teach kids who have

21 jan 2019

Who is joining our evening class? Why?

By NewTechKids

Ten days left until NewTechKids' 'How to Raise a Tech Innovator' evening class for parents on January 30th. The class take place from 19:00 - 21:00 at the central branch of the Amsterdam Public Library. Register now! We thought we'd share some interesting findings from the registration information provided by parents who will attend the class. 100%: parents of boys (The fact that no parents of girls have signed up for the class is unfortunate.

20 jan 2019

Margot Phillipps joins NewTechKids as Advisor

By NewTechKids

NewTechKids is super chuffed to announce that Margot Phillipps has joined our team as an advisor. Margot is a high school teacher in New Zealand who has taught Computing and Math at the high school and polytechnic level for 35 years. She also founded programs such as Young Women's Programming Contest and Programming Challenge 4 Girls in addition to the New Zealand Olympiad in Informatics. New Zealand is a leader in computer science education, home

22 dec 2018

New focus for NewTechKids in 2019

By NewTechKids

For more than four years, NewTechKids has focused on teaching computer science bootcamps to children ages seven to 12. We're very proud to have been one of the first companies to focus on this age range in Amsterdam and in the Netherlands. But we're moving into a new era where we need to take active steps to influence and re-shape the technology industry we have. For us, this means taking a long, hard look at

3 nov 2017

Tips for raising successful technologists: girls

By NewTechKids

Like most technology education academies, NewTechKids struggles to attract equal numbers of girls and boys to our programs. There are a lot of reasons for this. Most of the time, parents don't even present computer science and programming activities as options for their daughters. They conclude that computer science 'isn’t a fit' for their daughters although it's often 'perfect' for their sons. Girls themselves have told us that learning about technology is hard and often

4 sep 2017

Bring NewTechKids to your school in Amsterdam

By NewTechKids

NewTechKids works with primary schools in the Amsterdam area to help introduce computational thinking and computer science programs as part of formal school curriculum. Our programs integrate pedagogy, didactics, teaching approaches and classroom management and are based on the curriculum, lesson plans and teaching materials that we've developed, tested and taught over the last three years. Below are some of the schools where we've taught: Leonardo da Vinci School, Amsterdam NewTechKids teaches computer science programs

1 jul 2016

New Lessons on Smart Energy Systems

By NewTechKids

Last week, we engaged our students in some serious challenge-based learning in order to understand systems thinking and how computers are embedded into all kinds of systems. We challenged the 7-12 year old kids in our 'Computers and How They Work' summer bootcamp to work in teams to design and program a smart energy system which could respond to different temperatures and activate a heating system when the room temperature dropped. In the process, they learned about conditionals and if-else statements.