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Google Creates App That Teaches Adults How To Code

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CBS Local -- For many children computers have become the biggest resource when it comes to learning, socializing, and entertainment. With computer science becoming a bigger part of the world, some children are overtaking their parents in their knowledge of computer coding.

Google is now trying to help adults keep up with their tech-savvy kids by introducing an app designed to teach people how to code. The tech giant has launched an app called Grasshopper which turns learning how to write JavaScript into a more entertaining mobile game experience.

"Coding, sometimes called computer programming, is how we communicate with computers," the app's website explains. "You can use this skill to make websites and apps, process data, and do lots of other cool things."

The free app for both iOS and Android is reportedly designed to address three major factors adults said were keeping them from learning about computer science: time, access, and money. "You run up against a lot of these things as an adult, often being told that it's too complicated, or you just don't know where to start," Grasshopper founder and Google product manager Laura Holmes told Time. "We're trying to be the launchpad."

Through daily or weekly puzzles which make players input lines of code to reach a goal, Grasshopper is now taking their "fun and easy way" to learn computer programming public. Five thousand people reportedly graduated from the interactive training course while it was being tested by Google.

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