Melissa Misenhimer

ETEC 551
17 May 2014
Activity 13: Web Evaluation
Code Academy
www.codeacademy.com
Goals and Objectives
Code Academy is an education website founded in 2011 that instructs people how to code in six
different languages: HTML & CSS, jQuery, JavaScript, PHP, Python and Ruby. The main goals of Code
Academy is to disrupt old education techniques and make learning fun. They are committed to
providing a quality learning experience while also teaching the world to code. Their mission statement
is:
Were not one of those companies. We are rethinking education from the bottom up. The
web has rethought nearly everything commerce, social networking, healthcare, and more. We
are building the education the world needs the first truly net native education. We take more
cues from Facebook and Zynga in creating an engaging educational experience than we do from
the classroom.
Education is broke. Come help us build the education the world deserves.
- Code Academy, www.codeacademy.com
The mission statement is bold in itself and explains exactly what they want to do with their site. They
are interested in changing education for the better and hoping to teach everyone to code while doing it.
The website does not explain when Code Academy was found but does have a list of employees with
pictures on the site. The two co-founders are Zach Sims (CEO) and Ryan Bubinski (CTO). They also have
a number of engineers, designers, community managers, and content development employees. The
investors for the company are Collaborative Fun, Founder Collective, KPCB, OReilly, SVAngel, Thrive
Capital, Union Square Ventures and Index Ventures. The target audience for this site would be anyone
interested in learning programming. Although the design is simple and lessons are gradual, an
elementary school student and someone in their 60s could both get the same out of this site and learn
programming.

Content
The content of this website includes six different programming languages as well as giving practice to
build web projects and APIs. Each programming language has map of different levels it will take you
through and a time frame of how long it will take to complete the entire course.
It also gives a skill level for each programming language and a final project to build using that language.
The really dynamic piece of this website is that you can actually build your own courses to teach to

Melissa Misenhimer
ETEC 551
17 May 2014
others and share them with your classroom or others on the Code Academy site. There is also a large
community base where you can receive help from other Code Academy users and employees of the
company. This reminds me of MOOCs in that the social aspect of these courses help to support anyone
who wants to learn.
Language

Time

Technical Level

HTML & CSS

7 Hours

Beginner

jQuery

3 Hours

Beginner

JavaScript

10 Hours

Beginner

PHP

4 Hours

Beginner

Python

13 Hours

Beginner

Ruby

9 Hours

Beginner

Course Topics
Intro to HTML, HTML Structure: Using Lists, HTML
Structure: Tables, Divs, and Spans, Intro to CSS, CSS
Classes and IDS, CSS Element Positioning
Intro jQuery, jQuery Functions, Dynamic HTML, jQuery
Events, jQuery Effects
Intro to JavaScript, Functions, For Loops in JavaScript,
While Loops in JavaScript, Control Flow, Data
Structures, Objects I, Objects II
Welcome to PHP!, Control Flow: If/Else, Control Flow:
Switch, Arrays in PHP, Loops: For and Foreach, Loops:
While and Do-While, Functions in PHP Part I and II,
Object-Oriented Programming Part I and II, Advanced
Arrays and Maps
Python Syntax, Strings and Console Output,
Conditionals and Control Flow, Functions, Lists &
Dictionaries, Student Becomes the Teacher, Lists and
Functions, Loops, Exam Statistics, Advanced Topics in
Python, Introduction to Classes, File Input and Output
Intro to Ruby, Control Flow in Ruby, Looping with
Ruby, Arrays and Hashes, Blocks and Sorting, Hashes
and Symbols, Refactoring, Blocks, Procks, and
Lambdas, Object-Oriented Programming Part I and II

There are currently two other projects that you can build after youve gone through the language course
which includes both web projects and APIs. The web projects give instruction on how to build web
forms, date pickers, chart builders, video game builder and storefronts. The API projects gives
instruction on how to write apps and build websites that can connect with popular social media such as
Twitter, YouTube, and Evernote among many others.
e-Learning Principles
The layout of the website is simple and easy to follow. The graphics are minimal and correlate well with
each programming language you can learn. The minimum graphics actually work really well for this site
since the student will mostly be working in a programming language without a lot of frills throughout
most of the course.

Melissa Misenhimer
ETEC 551
17 May 2014

Choosing your language:

To begin using Code Academy, you create an account click the Learn tab at the top. Once you actually
begin a course, the website loads into a more instructional site with text and instructions on the left
hand side and the input for language on the right. Each topic begins with a short explanation of what
they are learning and how it ties into the language. There are multiple steps a student must go through
in order to finish each topic and the directions are clear on what the students need to do to move on
and includes hints, a link to a glossary and the Q & A Forum where the student can go to find answers if
theyre stuck. There are typically about 25-35 steps for each topic in a course. There is no audio help
for the instruction or an on-screen coach to help, although the instructions are written in a simple style
and are easy to follow.

Melissa Misenhimer
ETEC 551
17 May 2014

Beginning the HTML course:

As I mentioned before, the language in the instruction is really easy to follow with and puts technical
terms in a way that is easy for someone to follow who may not have a lot of computer experience. The
side tab does a good job of explaining exactly why you need to put a . or a ( in front of or in between
text or what the commands mean if you dont know. The glossary is a really important portion of the
learning experience because even if you were taught a word earlier in the lesson, you can click on
glossary and go look at the definition again if you forgot. The web community for Code Academy is also
really important because it gives students the opportunity to assist each other with the content. As I
was going through the PHP lesson, I was stuck as to what I needed to do and the hints were not helping
me so I jumped on the forum and found the answer quickly!
Q&A Forum:

Melissa Misenhimer
ETEC 551
17 May 2014

I definitely think that this would be a great tool for K-12 students who are interested in Computer
Science. Its a simple, clean design that makes it easy for them to follow along and learn basic and
complicated aspects of programming. There is also a point system where you receive points and badges
based upon goals youve completed that could help students compete against each other to keep them
interested. It could also help anyone in the technology field who may not have knowledge of
programming or just people who are interested in how it works. Its engaging in that students could
definitely spend multiple hours at once learning the programming language. The text is conversational
and it gets progressively more difficult making students want to stay and complete the course.
Since it is teaching programming, it definitely helps with analytical and critical thinking. The course
topics start with very basic code and then move on to more complicated strings forcing you to
remember things from the beginning topics for the later ones. Programming is built upon
understanding basic functions in order to create complicated websites and games and practicing these
languages can assist in the same logical skills used for mathematics.
I would definitely recommend this website to others who are interested in programming but arent sure
where to start or what language theyd like to learn. Each language gives you a brief overview of what
you could use it for a background as to what projects you could create. This website is interactive,
enjoyable and fun! This is definitely one of the better designed websites that Ive seen, especially for a
topic that is so technical in nature. The layout is easy to follow, the links and tabs are clearly labeled,
the graphics and text work well together and its a very simple process to start.
Credibility and Accuracy
The credibility of this site seems to be good. Each of the employees has their own portion of the site
where you can what badges or goals theyve accomplished and the last time they actually used Code
Academy. It seems as though most of the employees use it frequently which is important as designers
or engineers to understand your product. The company was founded in 2011 but their website does
seem to be updated quite a bit. When I first heard of Codeacademy last year, they only have five
languages and since then theyve added a sixth. Their copyright at the bottom also states 2014 so it has
been updated this year.

Melissa Misenhimer
ETEC 551
17 May 2014

Two similar sites that I found were code.org and also Code School. Both of these sites are similar to
Codeacademy in that they are interesting in teaching more people programming languages but are
different as far as interface and design. Code.org is more of a resource to give people information on
coding and teaches them fundamentals rather than actual code. I played through their first round of
coding tutorials and it just teaches what the code does rather than the actual language. Code School is
like Codeacademy in that you can take courses in different languages but it costs a monthly fee which
may not work for K-12 schools with limited budgets. Code School might be better for professionals or
college students but not for K-12.
Suggestions
The biggest suggestion that I could make for Codeacademy would be to add in an audio component to
their instructions. I believe that listening to audio as youre reading text helps to reinforce
comprehension and understand the material more. It would also help with students who are non-native
English speakers. Programming is a universal language, similar to math, and anyone can learn how to do
it but it may help someone who doesnt read English well to be able to hear the instructions rather than
read them. Even though the technical jargon is explained in easier terms, it would be difficult for
someone whose first language may be Spanish to fully comprehend.
Another small suggestion would be to have a link to the Q&A forum somewhere besides just inside the
courses. Right now, in order to get to the Q&A forum, you have to actually start a program and then
click on Q&A to get to it. I think they would have a lot more community involvement if they linked it on
their main page and would probably receive more answers this way. I was also disappointed with how
little social presence they had on their forums. I did see on their employee list that they had someone in
charge of community and I was surprised that her or more of the engineers didnt go into the forums
and answer questions for people.