Digital India- Need to learn the coding

India is on the fast pace to move to digital India. The current pandemic has pulled the dream of 2025 near. In today’s digital age, most children learn to swipe and click before they can speak coherently or walk. Smartphone and tablets are their digital pacifiers, companions and entertainers. Kids do not need to be proficient in reading or writing to do this because stories and images are used to explain the concepts.

Coding is about much more than teaching technology. It incorporates logic, problem-solving, and creativity in an engaging way for children of all ages. The non-cognitive skills that children develop through coding lessons are even more beneficial to young learners than the technical skills they acquire. Coding allows students to be creative without being wrong. If something doesn’t work, students must figure out why and determine how to fix it. Coding is the process of continually making mistakes, learning from them and correcting them. Coding requires creativity and critical thinking – future-ready skills that, along with collaboration and communication, are essential. Best of all, coding allows students to create content, rather than simply consume it – and that’s a must-have skill for functioning in today’s tech-driven world.

According to a report submitted at the Leadership Forum, there would be job cuts between 1.75 lakh and 2 lakh per year in next three years, due to under-preparedness in adapting to newer technologies. The report also mentions that nearly half of the workforce in the IT services firms will be “irrelevant” over the next 3-4 years.

We cannot wait for the government to formulate policy, top-down approaches are lethargic and byzantine which takes a lot of time to be implemented which our children do not have. Parents and educators would have to take a pro-active approach or else our children will be left behind in the 4th Industrial revolution.