My Java Journey
From the first line of code, I knew this camp would be a dream come true. Trading a canoe for a computer, I couldn’t wait to create my own computer game at iD Tech’s Java Programming week-long camp held on the Lake Forest College Campus. My computer lab held sixteen students, but the group was split into two classes of eight, each with their own counselor who went under a code name like shark bait or S++. They guided us through the process of learning to code Java.
Starting out with printing messages in the console and performing simple prompts, the learning ramped up, leading up into my final project to show my parents at the end of the week: a Brick Breaker game. The game took two days of work and nearly 500 lines of code with plenty of errors to correct, but the journey to completion made the success even more rewarding. I even had to program the velocity of the ball.
“Java is on over 3 billion devices,” says my iD Tech camp counselor Ben Malone, when asked why learning Java is a valuable skill. “It’s a universal coding language. All sorts of devices run it. It’s fairly easy to learn and has a wide variety of tools and uses.” I’ve always wanted to create a game, so Java seemed perfect, building on my math skills, having just completed 7th grade Algebra.
My takeaway: Java is a powerful tool to bring my imagination to life with code. I credit the fun, friends, activities and, of course, learning Java, for making my week at iD Tech camp the highlight of my summer. For more information, visit https://www.idtech.com.
by Liam Kivirst
Featured Image Courtesy of St. Louis Post-Dispatch
