Need Extra Help with Functions? Learn More About Support Ideas from the CodeHS team!

📚 Themed Projects

Another season, another great selection of themed projects to choose from! Consider assigning one of the ones listed below to add some extra fun to your course this winter.

Here are a few JavaScript projects related to some upcoming holidays:

Explore the Project Catalog

✏️ Extra Help with Functions

If you haven't already, pretty soon you’ll start diving into the Functions module, where students will learn more about functions with parameters, return statements, and variable scope. These are some of the most important, and most mixed-up, fundamental topics in this course. The better they understand this content, the more successful they will be in future lessons and beyond.

Here are a few ideas on how you can provide extra support in this module:

Go through the Examples together as a class, asking questions like, "What would happen if we moved this line of code to line X?" Or "What would happen if we deleted this line of code?"
Modify the Examples, or create new programs in the Sandbox (or as new assignments), so that students can get extra practice debugging these topics in programs other than their own.
As a warm-up activity, have them each write their own unique function that uses parameters and return statements effectively (ie creating a generalized function that produces an output based on the inputs, which is then stored in a local variable). The function can do anything they'd like it to do.

🤔 Extension Ideas: JS Tutorials

As the semester progresses, you may have a few advanced students who would love to dive into additional topics. Consider pointing them towards a tutorial or two, where they could learn the new concepts, apply them in their own programs, and/or teach them to the class!

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📈 Coding in the Wild Blog

The Coding the Wild posts are great for showcasing how professionals use computer science across multiple disciplines. Use them as supplemental material or extra credit to expose students to the broad applications of learning to code.

I recommend using “Coding for Oil and Gas.” It’s at a great reading level for middle school students and highlights some great advice for younger coders.

"Thanks to the advancements in computers, we can develop data science algorithms to leverage large amounts of data, and I can implement these algorithms through code." - Josh Hoskinson, Data Scientist at Chevron.

📅 PD Webinars and Workshops

Throughout the year, we host free webinars and workshops designed to help teachers learn more about the CodeHS platform and additional tools that can be used in the classroom.

If you’re interested in browsing our available content, check out our YouTube channel for past webinars and workshops.

Browse Available Webinars