Digital Odyssey 2014 : Code, the Most Important Language in the World

Thank you to those who attended and made this such a great event, we hope to see you again next year!

Friday June 6th, 2014
9:00 am – 5:00 pm
Oakham House, Ryerson University
55 Gould St
Toronto, ON M5B 1E9

2014’s Conference theme is “Code, the Most Important Language in the World.” The focus is on improving programming language literacy and becoming active in code and our communities.

Code is the common language between us and computers, the instructions we give our devices to get them to do what we want. Code is an integral part of human communication today and the more you can empower yourself with code, the better off you will be. Technology permeates all area of our lives and work, and whether you know it or not, someone somewhere wrote code that determines what you what you can and cannot do with every device and platform you interact with.

As librarians, we encounter technologies in all aspects of our work and we help our patrons navigate this technical world. To thrive in your interactions with technology it is important know what code is and the general concepts behind writing it. If you are ready to embrace code and bend computers to your will, even better. Improving our collective code literacy will help empower us in our daily work and let us better help our patrons learn this important skill.

Want to learn more about coding? Sign up for the “Learning Through Games” workshop where you will learn programming concepts and logic through gameplay with Scratch, an introductory programming language designed to help teach basic programming logic and techniques.

Interested in setting up a workshop to help your patrons learn to code? Sign up for the “Train the trainer” workshop and learn how to run and modify a Scratch workshop by doing it. Together, Kids Learning Code, Maker Kids, TIFF and Toronto Public Library, have developed comprehensive, maker curriculum for educators who work in formal and informal learning environments with the objective of increasing Toronto youth access and engagement with advanced technology and digital tools! These workshops and activities allow youth to create something with purpose, driven by their own vision and also empower teachers to be makers.

Program

Opening Keynote

Chrys Wu, Developer Advocate for The New York Times

Morning Sessions and Workshop

Lunch

OLA AGM

Afternoon Session and Workshop

Closing Keynote

Sean Yo, Information architect, web expert and community builder, Hive Waterloo