Coming from England where we culturally only speak one language I’ve always been amazed at the fact that most of our kids grow up here in Canada being naturally bi-lingual in both English and French. Having the benefit of two languages surrounding you as you develop is a fantastic gift. However, if your child is going to learn any new language, you might want to consider something like C#.

We love our gadgets and toys, our streaming TV and devices. What they can do for us and how they function can often seem like magic. All this technology runs via a set of intricate instructions that have been meticulously crafted by coders and designers around the world. Because our digitally native kids have so much exposure to it they are rapidly evolving into the next generation of programmers, innovators and technological engineers.

Simply put, knowledge of how to code and how to craft the devices of tomorrow is an essential skill. Not only that, it’s also really cool.

The benefits of learning a programming language are almost too numerous to count. It encourages logical thinking and problem solving as well as offers a fundamental understanding of how technology works. It also encourages creative thinking as coding often acts as a new way for your kids to bring their ideas to life.

There is a huge worldwide movement encouraging the use of coding, from dedicated courses and school programs that introduce it to kids, to apps of varying complexity depending on age and skill level.

Here at Budge we wanted to present coding to preschoolers via our Budge World subscription app and help them learn the basics coding in a fun and lighthearted way. That’s how our new activity Code Quest came to be. This is by far the most ambitious and robust activity in Budge World offering 50 different challenges the will introduce your kids to logical thinking, pathfinding and sequencing. Along the way they’ll help the Budger Pirates of Salty Sal and her crew explore tropical islands in a search for hidden treasure.

Our hope is that this activity will spark kids interesting in coding and help lay the foundations for understanding the intricacies of this technological world around them. Maybe this will be the first steps in your child’s very own Code Quest.

Ollie Sykes is the Creative Director here at Budge Studios and is also a father of two little gamers. He’s been making video game magic for over 20 years and also teaches game design at a local university.