Welcome to Create & Learn's Open Classes, featuring tech experts from top companies that teach how they use computer science in daily life. Here you will find upcoming events and recordings of previous events, that cover state of art technologies. Each approximately hour-long class is designed with kids in mind.
Discover all sorts of applications of computer science from computer scientists with decades of experience in leading technology companies. Pick your favorite free online classes for kids and save your spot today!
Our open classes provide children a unique opportunity to learn directly from some of the biggest experts in their fields, from NASA, Pixar, Apple, and more. In these live (and later on-demand) classes, students discover real-life applications of computer science. They find out what coding has to do with their favorite sports, see how medical research is influenced by computer science, learn all about the power of GPU and its impact on movies like Star Wars, plus so much more. When experts passionate about subjects teach kids, the results are unbelievable. Students leave open classes realizing the world is full of wonder! Start a computer science adventure today, that brings a lifetime of joy.
Imagine traveling through interstellar space aboard a spacecraft propelled by ultrathin sails. Sounds like science fiction? It might just become reality one day. The lightsail will travel faster than any previous spacecraft, with potential to eventually open interstellar distances to direct spacecraft exploration that are now only accessible by remote observation.
In this exciting online event, we will explore how Dr. Michael Kelzenberg and his team at Caltech are helping lead a global effort to make interstellar travel a reality. We'll discover how ultralight spacecraft can be propelled by powerful lasers using advanced “lightsails,” and how Caltech has built the world’s first platform to directly measure how laser light pushes on these sails. We’ll also hear about the challenges of sail design, material science, and how cutting-edge nanotechnology is helping guide and stabilize these sails, which will travel at about 20% of the speed of light.
Breakthrough Starshot bridges the gap between science and science fiction — turning bold dreams of travelling to another star system into a real scientific mission.
Dr. Michael Kelzenberg
Dr. Michael Kelzenberg is a staff scientist at Caltech, specializing in space-based solar power and interstellar propulsion. He earned his PhD in Electrical Engineering from Caltech in 2010, developing thin-film silicon photovoltaics that contributed to the founding of Caelux Corp. He later worked on microwave propulsion at Escape Dynamics and helped co-found ETC Solar (now Mesoline) to advance solar efficiency. Since 2016, he has contributed to Caltech’s Space Solar Power Project and the Breakthrough Starshot Initiative — which aims to send ultra-light probes to Alpha Centauri using laser-driven lightsails to explore the habitable-zone exoplanet of the Proxima Centauri system within our lifetimes. His interests include aviation, astrophotography, and exploring the desert southwest.
Learning coding, AI, robotics from Google, NASA, MIT, Stanford experts and more
Is your child excited about space? Meet a NASA expert to explore their mission to collect and bring asteroid rock back to Earth! In this FREE kids virtual event, your child will learn: 🪐 What is the NASA OSIRIS-REx Mission 🪐 How to travel to the near-Earth asteroid Bennu and bring back rock samples 🪐 Hands-on activities to learn space concepts guided by a NASA expert 🪐 What is it like to work at NASA and what the opportunities are to explore space for students 🪐 Ask the NASA expert any questions they want! Speaker: Nicole Lunning - Deputy OSIRIS-REx Curator, Johnson Space Center; Bruce Callow - Teacher and Co-author of
Join this fascinating event with NASA/Space expert, where engineering, coding, even art/movie making, and history all come together! Ben Feist is an engineer at NASA's Johnson Space Center (JSC) where he is designing and building the systems that will enable humanity’s return to the Moon. His work at NASA has been recognized with the JSC Software Excellence Award in both 2021 and 2022 with the latter project also being nominated for NASA Software of the Year. Ben’s path to NASA is somewhat unique. While his day job was in the private sector, he spent his evenings and weekends for nine years on a personal passion project that brought several of NASA’s Apollo missions to life online (http://apolloinrealtime.org [http://apolloinrealtime.org]). When NASA saw the work, they hired him. Ben’s Apollo work also earned him the 2019 Leif Erikson Exploration History Award, the 2020 Society of Historians in the Federal Government Excellence in New Media Award, a Gold Pencil at the 2020 One Show for Creativity, a D&AD 2021 Creative Excellence Award, and selection for publication in the 2021 Communication Arts Design Annual. In 2019, Ben was part of the team behind the critically acclaimed Apollo 11 IMAX film that took home three Emmy awards. He was also a member of the historic Apollo Mission Control restoration team that earned him the Texas Governor’s Award for Historic Preservation.
We are very honored to host a senior NASA leader Mrs. Sandra Cauffman for a Q&A session with our students. Mrs. Cauffman currently serves as the Deputy Director for the Astrophysics Division in the Science Mission Directorate (SMD) at NASA Headquarters. She helps provide executive leadership, strategic direction, and management for the entire agency’s multi-billion Astrophysics programs and missions necessary to discover how the universe works, to explore how the universe began and developed into its present form, and to search for Earth-like planets. Previously she served as Acting Director in the Earth Science Division from February 2019 to June 2020, and the Deputy Director for the Earth Science Division from May 2016 - October 2021. Sandra worked for 25 years at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center on missions such as the mission to Mars MAVEN [https://mars.nasa.gov/maven/], and Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite GOES-R [https://www.goes-r.gov/]. Cauffman is the first Costa Rican woman to lead a Mars related mission. Mrs. Cauffman has been awarded the NASA Exceptional Achievement Medal and she is a two-time recipient of the NASA Outstanding Leadership Medal. She is also a four times recipient of the NASA Acquisition Improvement Award, and numerous GSFC and HQ awards. Her profile has been highlighted by the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women for being a positive example for women, especially, youth and children. Due to her extensive work in outreach and STEM in Costa Rica and Latin America the Government of Costa Rica issued a stamp in her honor in 2017. We encourage you to come to this event with questions prepared. A few topics that Sandra is the ideal person to answer questions about include the mission to Mars MAVEN [https://mars.nasa.gov/maven/], NASA Earth Sciences [https://science.nasa.gov/earth-science], NASA Astrophysics Division [https://science.nasa.gov/astrophysics], and GOES-R Satellite System [https://www.goes-r.gov/]. We look forward to seeing you at this special event!
Is your child fascinated by AI and robots like R2-D2 in Star Wars or Transformers? Can we be friends with AI one day? Now AI (Artificial Intelligence) is everywhere - AI can now beat the highest ranking Go players, compose music, read medical images better than average doctors, and so much more. In this exciting event, your child will meet the Co-Head of Google's People + AI Research Center to explore the human-centered AI in the future. Sign up to save your spot for FREE today, and have fun!
Your child might be familiar with Google Maps, but do they know how scientists map the seafloor with cutting-edge technologies today? Join this exciting online event with Brandon - an education specialist at NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) - who will give the talk from his ocean expedition on a ship! Students will learn about the expedition - including remotely operated vehicles which could be analogs for exploration of water worlds, such as Europa, and the technology demonstrations for improved seafloor mapping. Your child will also be interested in Brandon's experience of being the technical advisor for Star Trek Discovery. Save your child's spot for free today!
Dr. Shawna Pandya is a citizen-scientist astronaut candidate with Project PoSSUM, physician, speaker, martial artist, advanced diver, skydiver and pilot-in-training. She holds degrees in neuroscience, space, entrepreneurship and medicine, and is currently completing a fellowship in Wilderness Medicine. In 2015, Dr. Pandya completed Scientist-Astronaut Candidate training with Project PoSSUM (Polar Suborbital Science in the Upper Mesosphere) and was part of the first crew to test a commercial spacesuit in zero-gravity; her work with Project PoSSUM and Final Frontier Design was captured in the CBC Documentary, “We Are Canada.” She has continued to test commercial spacesuits with Project PoSSUM’s annual microgravity parabolic flight campaigns, and has completed over 100 parabolas in microgravity to date. Dr. Pandya is also the lead instructor forProject PoSSUM’s EVA 102: Space and Wilderness Medicine course. As part of Project PoSSUM, she also completed hypobaric hypoxia training, centrifuge studies, aerobatic flight, basic and advanced emergency spacecraft egress and sea survival training, and high altitude noctilucent cloud research. Dr. Pandya also completed a 2-week tour at the Mars Desert Research Station analog in Utah as the Crew Health and Safety Officer. She has recently been named as an ambassador for the PoSSUM 13, an initiative to make space opportunities and engagement more accessible to students, particularly girls and young women. She also serves as the Chair of Strategic Development for this initiative. Dr. Pandya will be attaining her aquanaut designation with a mission to the Jules Verne Underwater Lodge later this year and successfully completed the World Extreme Medicine Hyperbaric and Dive Medicine Course at Florida International University’s Aquarius Reef Base, where NASA NEEMO missions take place, attaining her Dive Medical Technician designation in the process. Her adventures and experiences were recently captured in the Land Rover short, released with the Apollo 11: First Steps film. In her spare time, Dr. Pandya practices Taekwondo (as a second-degree black belt) and Muay Thai. She is currently working towards her private pilot’s license and holds her accelerated free fall solo skydiving license and numerous SCUBA diving certifications. Dr. Pandya also sings and plays the piano.
Does your child love playing video games? Do they want to explore the business and technology behind the esports tournaments of the most popular games like Fortnite and League of Legends? In this fun online event, your children will meet an Esports expert to learn every aspect behind the scenes of eSports gaming, including AI and VR Technology, Graphic Design, Video Editing, Marketing, Management, Entrepreneurship, IT, Web Design and Ecommerce, and more. Kids can even learn to design a league logo like a professional! And explore different ways to transform their passion for gaming to a professional coding career in the future. Sign up to save your child's spot for FREE today!
What's your favorite movies - Cars, Frozen, or maybe The Avengers? Did you know that computer technology is behind the making of all of your favorite movies? Using numerous examples drawn from Pixar’s feature films, this talk will provide a behind the scenes look at the role that computer science has played in the revolution of filmmaking. I’ll also introduce Pixar in a Box (pixarinabox.org), a free on-line collaboration with Khan Academy that demonstrates how middle and high school math and science concepts are used to address creative challenges faced at Pixar.
From self-driving cars, diagnosing diseases, to creating music and art, AI (artificial intelligence) will be increasingly powering our world. But what powers AI? To find out, join this eye-opening talk by May Casterline, Senior Scientist from Nvidia, the company that builds the most powerful processors for AI. Here is another fun fact, Nvidia processors are also used in the most powerful gaming machines and are behind many blockbuster movies. How is that possible? Join to find out!
Are you fascinated about space travel and going to Mars? With the recent NASA and SpaceX launches, we are getting closer everyday to calling space our new home? 🚀 But there are huge challenges. Many simple things become very difficult in space, like talking to someone in space. In this fun event, your child from Grades 4-10 will meet Dr. Frank at NASA to explore how humans and robots can work together to explore outer space. Watch our exclusive video now to learn more about how NASA uses computer science to solve the many challenges in going to Mars.
Computers are helping us solve many toughest problems in the world from understanding climate change, environmental impacts, expansion of the universe, to decoding viruses like COVID19. The toughest problems need more powerful computers, in fact, they need supercomputers! So what's a supercomputer? No, it doesn't have a cape. :) How does it work? And most importantly, what problems can it solve? In this talk, one of the top experts, Prof. Yelick from UC Berkeley, will introduce you to the fascinating field of Supercomputers and the powerful things they can deliver. Prof. Yelick received her PhD degree in Computer Science in MIT. She is a professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences at Berkeley and the Associate Laboratory Director for Computing Sciences at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.
Your child probably spends a lot of time playing games, right? 😏 Why not encourage them to build their own games and make an awesome career out of it?! 🎮 In this live online event, your child from Grades 4-10 will meet a game expert from Unity, one of the biggest game companies in the world. Students will explore how to create a car-driving game with Unity Bolt, a cool coding tool, and also learn about how to become a game developer. The expert’s recent work includes developing and optimizing Nintendo Switch ports, real-time multiplayer VR experiences, and simulation with the Microsoft Hololens. Sign up for the free event today, and have fun!
Does your child want to know how the amazing Airbnb website was built? Meet an Airbnb expert and explore the latest technologies behind travel magic nowadays, like websites and cloud computing! In this class, your child (Grades 4-10) will learn about: ✈️ What Airbnb, is and what it is like working at Airbnb 🖥 Airbnb website infrastructure such as Frontend, Backend, Dataflow ☁️ How Airbnb stores tons of data globally using Cloud Computing 🙋 Fun hands-on activities with Airtable to test your new knowledge Sign up to save your spot for FREE today, and have fun!
Your kid can't get enough of Roblox, right? But do you know that almost all the 40 million games on Roblox were created by the community and many of these people started building games when they were kids? Yes, everyone can build games on Roblox, not just play. Come join our speaker from Roblox to check out their cool tools to code, build, and design games in Roblox, and have fun! Enroll in the class now and then get a head start to build games at https://developer.roblox.com/en-us/resources/learn-and-explore/index.html
Does your child like robots? Do they want to join the largest robotics competition in the world? Join this great event to meet Nancy, one of the TOP 50 most influential women in robotics. Nancy is a robot expert at REC Foundations which operated VEX - the largest and fastest growing robotics competition globally with 24000 teams in over 60 countries from elementary school through college students. In this class, your child from Grades 4-10 will learn about VEX and get valuable tips to learn robotics. Sign up for free today, and have fun!
Does your child enjoy Minecraft? Wouldn’t it be amazing to build an entire University campus in Minecraft? 🏫 Join this fun class to meet the creators from MIT who built the 1:1 scale replica of their entire campus in Minecraft with stunning details. Your child will take a tour to this virtual campus and learn how more than 200 students, professors, alumni from MIT worked together to build this amazing world within only a few weeks. They will share how they came up with creative coding solutions to build several difficult buildings from outside to interiors, and how to host big events in the game! Sign up for free today, and join us to explore this amazing campus in Minecraft together!
Does your child love sports? Do they want to explore the fun data behind their favorite sports like swimming, baseball, and soccer? Join this class to learn about state-of-the-art technologies to analyze sports data to get better performance. Your child from Grades 3-10 will meet the data science professor and our coding teacher who is also a swimming coach & sports analyst. You will find your child more motivated to learn math, coding, and data science because they can combine them with the sports they are passionate about. Sign up for free today, and have fun!
Does your child want to build an amazing world in Minecraft? How about building the entire campus of a top university in the entire world? 🏫 Wait no more. Join this fun premier online event where a team of Berkeley students will share how they created more than 100 buildings on their “Minecraft” campus “Blockeley University”! Your child will take a tour to this virtual campus and learn how such a huge, amazing, and complex world was created. They will also show you how they came up with creative coding solutions to host big events like the commencement, graduation, and even music festivals within the virtual campus. Sign up for free today, and join us to explore this amazing campus in Minecraft together!
On this event, the Berkeley team and an official Berkely tour guide will take you to tour their entire campus built in Minecraft. Join this event to explore more than 100 buildings in the Minecraft campus and the student life in Berkeley. If you have the Minecraft Java Edition, you can also have the chance to log into Minecraft and actually walk around (and fly) in this meticulously built campus with the Berkeley students. Since the spots to log into Minecraft are limited, please also fill out the below form to save your spots and we will pick randomly from the form. Fill out this form if you want to log into Minecraft for the tour (require Minecraft Java Edition): https://forms.gle/dtrfCBx3iMkSWnPZ9 If you don't have the Minecraft Java Edition, you can just sign up for the event to watch the tour!
If you are like most of us, you probably spend a lot of time playing games. But how are these games made? It turns out most of them are made with game engines so that it is a lot easier to build powerful games. And Unity, without a doubt, is the most popular of them all. Come Join our expert speaker from Unity to learn how some of the powerful games are made in Unity and get a taste of how to build games with Unity yourself.
Do you know that there is more computational power in a mobile phone these days than the Apollo 13th that landed on the moon? That little thing is truly amazing... videos, games, chat, pictures... It does it all. But how? Join us in this Open Class with an Android developer from Google to learn more about Android, the system that powers many billions of mobile devices in the world. See how professionals create mobile apps and try to develop something of your own.
From WALL-E, Baymax, to Transformers, Robots have filled our fascinations. But what kinds of robots will be most helpful in our daily lives? In this Open Class, Professor Atkeson from the Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon University will walk us through the basics of robotics and then explore soft robots, which have soft cushiony bodies. His work in soft robots helped shape Baymax, the main character of Disney movie Big Hero 6 and one of the most beloved robot characters
What happens behind the scenes when you play an online game like Minecraft or watch an online video, or text your friends on Snapchat? Is there a magical factory somewhere that does all the work? Where is this factory, and what happens inside it? Join this open class and find out! Winnie leads Energy projects at Google Cloud. She works with energy companies to use artificial intelligence, data analytics and cloud computing. She started working at Google 15 years ago. Besides working at Google, Winnie loves animals. She helps the World Wildlife Fund save elephants and other endangered species. Winnie studied Engineering at the University of Waterloo in Canada. She also studied Energy and Climate at Johns Hopkins University.
Do your kids love playing computer games? Do you know your kids can now help scientists solve the puzzles and design vaccines by playing games? Genetics, together with computer science, are two of the most promising fields for the future. Join this talk to learn the basics of genetics and explore the fun game designed by Stanford experts!
You probably already know how to read a map and a bar chart but do you know how to read a network? Do you know that you are part of many networks? What's even a network? Join us to learn why networks are critically important for us to understand and its connection to most of our online life (like Amazon, YouTube, Roblox, and more). If you want to see a network, though, you need to use data visualization. In this Open Class, you will learn different kinds of networks and get a chance to create your own!
Code games and animations with beginner-friendly Scratch coding
Solve puzzles, build, and create games with fun coding in Minecraft
Fast-paced introduction to Scratch coding: build games, stories, and animations
Discover how AI fuels self-driving cars, face recognition, and other advanced technologies
