You never know where inspiration will strike.

Peter is a 13 year-old boy in 8th grade at the Chinese American International School in San Francisco. He started with a coding mentor back in September and right away started making exciting games.

In December he was in the holiday spirit and created a game using Christmas and Hanukkah colors.

Breakout, the One Player Pong

Breakout Mentors is named after a computer game that is fun to code. In fact, this was the first game that Brian Skinner, the founder of Breakout Mentors, created in Stanford’s introductory Java class!

Our kids working with mentors love creating it as well. Play Peter’s holiday themed game and check out his finished game and Python code:

Kids Add Their Own Creative Features

The color scheme isn’t the only unique twist in Peter’s project. Did you notice the game actually starts with TWO balls?

For a novice coder, two balls require twice as much code. However, by taking advantage of more abstract programming concepts like object-oriented and list data structures, it doesn’t take much more effort. This reveals the true power of coding.

In fact – Peter can add a THIRD ball with just one line of code!

Project-Based Learning

Peter’s mentor is a Computer Science student at UC Berkeley. Our mentors guide students in creating engaging projects while ensuring an optimal level of challenge.

The hard part of learning to code is not simply a concept like storing information in a list. It is knowing why and how you use that concept to achieve the desired result.

Breakout Mentors believes this personalized approach is the most effective way for kids to learn to code. There is no limit to how far kids can go with the help of a mentor – continually learning the next thing, challenged at the right pace, and deepening their love of coding year-round.

If you are curious how a mentor would benefit your son or daughter, please schedule a time for a short phone call.