I can’t really figure out why, but the second Tuesday in October is celebrated annually as Ada Lovelace Day, a day to recognize the accomplishments of women in STEM and encourage women and girls to explore STEM careers. (It’s definitely a worthy day I just don’t know why it is this particular day. She was born Dec. 10, 1815 and died Nov. 27, 1852, so the day had no clear connection to her.)
It’s a great day to celebrate the legacy of Ada Lovelace, the daughter of the poet Lord Byron (though he was not involved in her life and her education was directed by her mother) who was a pioneer in early computing. She worked with Charles Babbage on his proposed Analytical Engine, a general-purpose computer that was never built. She recognized that the computer could be used as more than just a calculator, and she wrote the first algorithm for a computer to follow, making her the world’s first computer programmer.
Science Sparks has a good printable fact file on her that you can use to get started learning about her and her accomplishments. Kids Konnect has fact sheets and printables you can use in the classroom or at home to talk about her life and work.
Get a free set of printable punch card numbers to use for number recognition with an early-computing twist from Playground Parkbench.
Teach Starter has a basic coding activity using pattern recognition that little kids can do. Any activity involving coding without a computer would be a great thing to do to celebrate this day. Or use scratch to build a poetry generator, with this project from the Raspberry Pi Foundation.
Check out a BrainPop video on Ada Lovelace below.
If you need more resources, there are tons of printables related to Ada Lovelace on Teachers Pay Teachers, including reading passages, coding projects and other STEM activities and more.
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