The summarizing conference of school clubs of pupils’ programming (coding) was held in the Technical Park, where pupils presented computer games arranged on the code.org platform. Deputy Minister of Education and Science Temur Murgulia, Chairman of Innovation and Technology Agency Giorgi Zviadadze, General Manager of Microsoft Georgia Nikoloz Doborjginidze and Director of Educare Georgia Giorgi Jibladze got acquainted with the works of pupils and addressed them at the conference.
The beneficiary companies of “Startup Georgia”, WiFisher and GRID.GE, also shared their experience with the pupils, and the employees of Technical Park arranged an interesting tour for children.
Programming lessons are held in schools since February 2017 within the framework of the project “Free Lessons” initiated by the Ministry of Education and Science of Georgia. At the first stage, 11 public schools were involved in the project throughout Georgia. School clubs of coding were created by the partnership of the Ministry of Education and Science of Georgia, Microsoft Georgia and Educare Georgia, where pupils began to study the fundaments of programming through arrangement of games and funny applications. The lessons included computer activities and the programming elements introduced in real life. At the end of the program the pupils arranged individual games and applications. Expansion of the program is planned from the next academic year.
Today, computer programming and computer sciences are the most demanded professions throughout the world and the demand significantly exceeds the delivery. In Europe, 15 countries are already implementing programming and computer sciences in the main curriculum of the school. Programming is not only the skill for people who want to work in the technology sector, but also for the pupils in order to develop logical thinking and problem solving skills.