Code for Nature Challenge

🎉 We are thrilled to announce the final winners of the 2024 Code for Nature Challenge 🎉🎊🎈! The winning projects used a diverse range of tools, including Scratch, Python, Roblox, Minecraft, AI, WIX, Canva, and more. Students not only displayed strong coding skills but also demonstrated impressive creativity, humor, and artistic talent. Most importantly, they all shared a deep passion for nature!

Explore the winning projects below, and we look forward to seeing you next summer for another exciting round of the Code for Nature Challenge!

🎉 Reef Rescuers by Varsha (Roblox) - received the special Snap Circuit award for the nice combination of art and game design.
🎉 Save The Beach by Sarah (Canva)
🎉 Pick Up Trash by Gerry (Scratch)
🎉 Save The Ocean by Suri (Art)
🎉 Reuse, Recycle Website by Dishita (WIX)
🎉 Save the World by Carina (Minecraft)
🎉 OceanWatch by Azhmeer (AI, Python) - Received special InfoSys award for the use of AI
🎉 EcoLog website by Emily (Web Development)
🎉 Save The Trees story by Ayan (Scratch)
🎉 Nature Project by Ben (Scratch)

Scroll down to see more top projects at the bottom of this page.

--- The 2024 Code for Nature Challenge is closed. Check out the information below to learn more, and get ready for the 2025 Challenge early ---

What do you love the most about nature —the scent of grass after a gentle rain, the early morning chirping of birds, crystal-clear lakes, deep green forests, or majestic snow-capped mountains? Unfortunately, our world is heading in a troubling direction, with record-breaking heat waves, widespread drought, more intense hurricanes, and the accompanying disappearance of habitats for animals on land, in rivers, and in oceans. Adults today can still recall what nature was like 20 years ago, but what about the children? What kind of world will they inherit in another 20 years?

At Create & Learn, we believe that the fundamental goal of learning is to solve real-world problems. So we are hosting a Code for Nature challenge this summer to encourage students to apply what they have learned to raise awareness, protect our nature, help those affected by environmental change, and potentially solve some critical issues.

How to Enter the Code for Nature Challenge

Students can use any platforms or tools to build stories, games, or apps with a general nature theme. Some examples might include:

A Scratch game that teaches people how to conserve energy when driving or using air conditioning.
A Minecraft mod that creates a nature-friendly city with plenty of plants, trees, flowers, and habitats for wildlife.
A mobile app that calculates how much CO2 people are generating from activities like driving, fast fashion, and food waste.
An AI system that recognizes if plants are under heat stress.
A Canva poster highlighting the biggest contributors to environment change.

And so much more… In particular, we encourage students to uncover and address what has affected their own areas the most.

Winners will be selected through a combination of community voting and evaluation by our teacher experts. Ten winners will each receive a $15 Amazon gift card (see FAQ for details). Students in grades 2-12 are welcome to join. Submit your project by August 25th, and we will announce the winners by September 10th.

New! (Aug 8th) We are excited to announce two new special awards sponsored by Texas Instruments and Infosys Foundation USA, two leading tech companies.

Infosys Foundation USA’s mission is to expand access to computer science and maker education for K-12 students and educators across the USA, while working to digitally upskill all learners for 21st century technology-enabled opportunities. We invite you to explore the free resource and course offerings on Infosys Springboard USA: bit.ly/InfySpringboard. Infosys' special prize will be awarded to the project with the most innovative idea for using AI or other technologies. You don’t have to implement the AI—presenting the most compelling idea will get you a chance.

Texas Instrument (TI) is one of the top 10 semiconductor companies worldwide. The TI-Nspire™ CX II and TI-84 Plus CE Python graphing calculators come with Python preloaded and ready to code with built-in menus and smart features that help beginners get started. www.education.ti.com/cs. TI’s special prize—a brand-new TI-Nspire CX II calculator—will be awarded to the project with the best innovative idea for using hardware. Similarly, you don't have to build the hardware, just showcase your idea would qualify for consideration.

These special awards will be selected from among the top 10 projects, all of which will receive a $15 Amazon gift card (see FAQ for details). Don't miss our last free Code for Nature Workshop for help and inspiration in creating an awesome project!

How to submit:

You may submit projects on your own or with up to two other friends. In other words, the maximum group size is 3. Each student can submit up to 2 projects. Students are not required to have taken any classes with us to submit projects.

Please follow these steps to subject projects:

Login to https://www.create-learn.us/account. You will need to create an account if you are new to Create & Learn.
Press Add a Student button on the bottom left if you don’t have a child added already.
Click on Portfolio under your child’s name.
Click on the Add Project button on the next page, then follow the instructions. You can access all projects submitted on this portfolio page as well.

Join Free Code for Nature Challenge Workshop Events

Code for Nature Challenge Workshop

Grades 2-12
The world is changing: record-breaking heat waves, widespread drought, intense hurricanes, and the accompanying disappearance of habitats for animals on land, in rivers, and in oceans. Encourage your student to enter our Code for Nature challenge, and apply what they have learned to raise awareness, protect the environment, help those affected by environmental change, and potentially solve environmental issues. Submit your project by August 25th for a chance to be one of 10 winners to win a $15 Amazon gift card!
To help students create their projects, we are hosting a series of free live online events led by an expert. Sign up for the event anyway even if you can't join to get the latest information.
- July 20th at 11 am PT: Introduction to the challenge, collecting data, and identifying local environmental issues you're passionate about. Access recording if you missed it.
- July 26th at 5 pm PT: Defining project ideas for the issues you've identified, (Access recording for session 2)
- August 4th at 11 am PT: Coding assistance - come ask any questions you might have
- August 18th at 10 am PT: Coding assistance and guidance on how to submit projects
These events will attract many students, so save your spot today. You can submit to the challenge regardless of whether you join the workshop or not.
Build skills to create any project you can dream to help the planet in our popular live online classes:
- Scratch Ninja (grades 2 - 5) or Accelerated Scratch (grades 6 - 9)
- Canva for Kids (grades 4 - 8)
- Mobile Coding for Apps and Games (grades 5 - 10)
- Python for AI (grades 5 - 12)

Code for Nature Challenge FAQs

Q: How many projects can I enter?

You can enter up to two projects per student, but each student can only win once.

Q: Do I have to be a Create & Learn student to join?

No, you do not need to be a Create & Learn student to participate. However, when submitting the project, you do need a free Create & Learn account.

Q: About the $15 winner award

Winners in the US will have the option of taking a $15 Amazon.com gift card or taking the $15 as class credits. For students outside of the US, we only issue class credits since we are unable to issue gift cards that are not for the Amazon.com US store. For the special prizes, similarly, we can only send it to students within the United States. If a student outside of the US is the winner, we will add another $30 to the class credits and the physical prizes will be sent to the first US based winner.