School Library Journal Starred Review

Gr 6 Up-he creator of the nationwide coding club phenomenon Girls Who Code provides a top-down look into the world of computer science and women in the field. The author takes a step-by-step approach to teaching the intricacies of coding while keeping the content relevant to the audience (a smart analogy involving a peanut butter and jelly sandwich effectively demonstrates computational thinking). Aided by Tsurumi's humorous cartoon drawings that feature a reoccurring group of five girls, the text takes students through the entire process of a coding project. Saujani stresses the importance of planning, critical thinking, implementation, and debugging. Readers will enjoy the creative freedom the work offers, as sample projects refreshingly don't rely on specific programs. The author concisely explains different subject areas within computer science. A highlight of the book is the sidebar profiles that feature real-life women developing the world of coding, from Pixar's Danielle Feinberg to professor and roboticist Ayanna Howard. VERDICT This timely, well-written title is an excellent resource for budding coders; it bridges the wide gap between simple how-to guidebooks and complex coding textbooks.Lisa Bosarge, Enoch Pratt Free Library, Baltimore

ALA Booklist

Saujani, founder of Girls Who Code (a national nonprofit organization that educates young women with computing skills), is on a mission to close the gender gap in technology. With the help of multicultural girls, represented in appealing tween- and teen-friendly cartoon images, the author introduces the concept of coding, some of its terminology, and its problem-solving process. Using a conversational tone and easy-to-understand examples (such as comparing coding to stringing different patterns of beads), she also explains numerous real-world applications of coding, including digital art, websites, mobile apps, animation, video games, and robots. The text does not teach specific coding skills or languages (although they are represented graphically), but readers who are studying these on their own will benefit from chapters on design, debugging, and other related topics. Particularly eye-opening are interviews with current female coders in high-tech fields and with the featured multicultural girls, all of whom describe projects on which they've worked. Above all, this book makes coding less intimidating and more inspiring to today's young women.

Horn Book

Saujani, founder and CEO of the organization Girls Who Code, expands her campaign to inspire girls to develop computing skills and overcome inequities in the tech field with this solid introduction to coding. The narrative incorporates historical background and highlights female success stories. Comic illustrations depicting a diverse cast of girls accompany clear instructions and diagrams and approachable discussions of coding basics. Glos., ind.

Kirkus Reviews

A guide to get girls into coding, written by Saujani, the founder of the Girls Who Code organization, with Hutt's assistance.Rather than serving as a manual for a specific coding language, this book has two focuses: encouraging girls that coding is something they can do and guiding them to entry points that will make programming relevant to their specific interests. Internalized societal messages about girls' STEM abilities and the pressure on girls to be perfect are addressed head-on through spotlights on women in programing history and interviews with impressive women working in programming (such as Danielle Feinberg of Pixar, who tells how a bug in her code created an amazing new effect). After obligatory computer history, the chapters are organized first with programming logic and theory that will serve regardless of the programming language used (including creative prompts to nurture new ideas and give young programmers confidence), and then into the fun to be had programming applications—apps, games, digital art, robots, etc. These segments feature interviews with real Girls Who Code teams speaking of how they created successful projects, and a multicultural cartoon cast appears in comic strips working on specific projects. Having demonstrated what projects each programming language is for, the resources at the end direct girls to code tutorials so they can start their own projects. Final art not seen. An encouraging supplementary resource for young coders. (glossary, index) (Nonfiction. 9-16)

Publishers Weekly (Fri Oct 06 00:00:00 CDT 2023)

Saujani, a former public advocate and Congressional hopeful, founded the nonprofit Girls Who Code in response to gender imbalance in the tech industry. In this accessible guidebook, she introduces five diverse girl characters (rendered in Tsurumi-s two-color cartoons, and also starring in a companion series of novels) who voice their questions and concerns in dialogue balloons (-Umm... I-m not sure I understand what a programming language is and why there are different ones-). As readers learn about designing, building, and testing coding projects, the girls- growing confidence is evident. Saujani also introduces past female tech pioneers and includes advice from women currently working in various industry roles. For readers new to coding and computer science, Saujani makes its importance and potential clear, showing girls that coding is, in essence, a problem-solving tool that they can use to invent, explore, and take charge. Ages 10-up. Author-s agent: Richard Pine, Inkwell Management. Illustrator-s agent: Stephen Barr, Writers House. (Aug.)