Digital education thrives on people who share their passion, and that is exactly what several of our colleagues did during this year’s Code Week Thuringia. Every year, the initiative provides an opportunity to show children and young people, in a fun and engaging way, just how much they can achieve with digital technologies.
As a company that embraces innovation in software development every day, we are committed to supporting activities that inspire young talent to explore technology from an early age. That is why our dedicated colleagues once again visited local schools this year to demonstrate how exciting programming, computer science, and the development of creative digital ideas can be. We would like to share some of their personal impressions and highlights from Code Week 2025.
Children can instantly relate to games such as Fortnite, Brawl Stars, and Minecraft. Our goal was to show them that there are also fascinating and understandable concepts and challenges behind these games.
As part of Code Week, a team from ORISA was once again on the road, sharing our enthusiasm for computer science with young students. We were accompanied by two small robots, giving the children the opportunity to try programming themselves and immediately see the results come to life in their classroom. In total, we visited four classes at two schools, delivering a double-period workshop in each one.
The first session always focused on theory, enriched with small hands-on activities. We introduced the key people involved: first ourselves as speakers, sharing our backgrounds and connection to computer science, and then the two main figures featured on our poster, Ada Lovelace and Alan Turing.
Together with the students, we gradually filled the poster with concepts such as algorithm, programming language, and problem-solving. The aim was to build a bridge between a theoretical solution to a problem and a real program that could control a robot. This was also where the students got their first glimpse of our little robot friend, Cubetto.
During the practical session, Cubetto needed the participants’ help to navigate his world map and reach the correct destination. The students worked together to develop suitable programs for different challenges. For example, Cubetto needed to drive to a castle but was facing the wrong direction. “What’s the command for turning?”, “No, you need to use the other block!”, “Can he drive around me?”, “Oh no, now he’s driving off the map!”
The greatest challenge for us was often making sure that only one child at a time was programming the robot. The older classes even managed to create an infinite loop, sending Cubetto driving in circles over and over again.
We hope the students enjoyed the experience as much as we did and that their enthusiasm for computer science continues to grow long after Code Week has ended.
Heidi, Marie-Christin R., and Matthias K.