Cuddle Code

BY Laura Bloch

CuddleCode is a maker kit that enables girls ages 6-10 to create their own programmable stuffed animals. This kit builds strong emotional connections between young girls and computer programming through their creation of their own stuffed animals. The primary focus of CuddleCode is on girls making with their parents or other adults in their homes. Sitting at the intersection of physical creation and digital programming, CuddleCode provides girls with a “transitional object,” or a physical object enabling the transition of reasoning from physical to formal environments. Through assembling their own stuffed animal, girls will build an emotional relationship with and get to know the stuffed animal and its various parts. In adding code to program the stuffed animal, they will combine inputs, outputs, and logic to create computational systems.