Module #1
Intro to Computer Science
How do computers store information? Numbers, text, pictures, sounds… All of this using only 0s and 1s! In this module students learn the binary system and then work their way through the basics of data representation, with secret messages, coloring activities and more.
This is a very quick first lesson! In it students think about different categories of information that computers can hold – as well as different types of computers. Students are then told that this information is stored as a series of 0s and 1s, which will serve as an opening for the next class…
The 0s and 1s that a computer holds are called bits! A bit is the most basic unit of information that a computer works with, and each bit can either be 0 or 1. This lesson explores the physical process behind the storage of these bits, and the underlying mechanism where something has to alternate between two distinguishable states (0 and 1).
The internet! Millions of computers throughout the world are interconnected and communicate with each other, exchanging all sorts of information – including text. That information takes the form of bits (0s and 1s) that get sent through wires and other means. By learning about binary representation of letters, students get to exchange secret messages and find out how all this works.
