Ten years ago, every parent was advised to sign their child up for a coding workshop. Today, an AI writes in seconds a program that a beginner would need a week to produce, and parents ask me whether it is still worth it.
I tell them yes. Not to guarantee a career any more, though: so that they know how to check what a machine produces.
Coding is no longer a guaranteed career
Coding used to be sold as a guaranteed career of the future. It is no longer that simple: a good part of the work given to junior developers, writing routine functions and fixing common bugs, is now assisted by AI tools. Learning the syntax of a language "to have a job" is a poor bet.
Writing code to be able to read an AI's
Programming teaches something else: breaking a problem into steps, naming things exactly, anticipating where everything breaks, checking that the result is right. It is reasoning, very close to mathematics. And it is what will let your child judge an AI's work instead of copying it.
A student who has written a few programs themselves quickly sees when code suggested by an AI is wrong, or right by chance. One who has never written any has to trust it.
At what age, and how
Before ten, there is no rush. Logic games, puzzles, construction toys and block-based programming such as Scratch are more than enough. At that age, what counts is arithmetic, reading and the ability to follow reasoning to the end.
In French schools, block programming is part of the lower secondary mathematics curriculum. In high school, algorithms in Python form one part of the first-year mathematics programme, and the computer science specialist subject (NSI) takes students further in the last two years. A student at ease in mathematics does not need expensive courses: a good book, a small personal project and an adult who reads their code are enough.
What I advise families
Do not replace mathematics with coding. A child who programs without solid mathematics tinkers; a child who is strong in mathematics learns to program in a few months, at any age. If you have to choose where their hours go, put them there first.
Then have them build something useful: a small game, a tool for a club, a page for an association. With an AI beside them if they wish, provided they understand every line they keep. The choice of language matters little.
Knowing what to work on, and in what order, depends on your child. That is what I build with families in an action plan: their actual level, what they need to build, and the timeline that goes with it.