Raspberry Pi Foundation partners with FutureLearn for online teacher training

The Raspberry Pi Foundation has partnered with social learning provider FutureLearn to launch two free online training courses for teachers focused on computing and digital skills.

The courses are designed to give teachers the experience and insight to use digital making effectively in the classroom and are available to teachers all over the world.

The four-week ‘Teaching Computing with Raspberry Pi and Python’ course introduces teachers to physical computing and highlights how easy it can be to create a system that responds to and controls the physical world, using computer programs running on the Raspberry Pi.

The second four-week course, ‘ Teaching Programming in Primary Schools’, provides a comprehensive introduction to programming for primary teachers who are not subject specialists. It introduces key programming concepts and gives teachers the opportunity to to apply their understanding through projects, both unplugged and on a computer, using Scratch as the programming language.

Carrie Anne Philbin, director of education for the Raspberry Pi Foundation, commented: “The Raspberry Pi Foundation has a simple, but ambitious mission: to put the power of digital making into the hands of people all over the world. By the end of 2016, we will have trained over 540 educators to teach Raspberry Pi through our Picademy live events. However, we wanted to find a way to scale our teaching and to reach many more educators around the world. We’re therefore delighted to be partnering with a social learning platform like FutureLearn so that many more teachers across the world can have access to our classes in an interactive and flexible way.”

Nigel Smith, head of content for FutureLearn, commented: “We are thrilled to add Raspberry Pi to our portfolio of partners. Their ethos to bring learning to anyone anywhere absolutely fits with our own company ambitions and we are excited to make a start on what promises to be a hugely beneficial set of courses together.”

People can sign up to courses now, with the courses themselves starting in mid-February 2017.