It seems like code.org either has baby coding lessons for toddlers or very advanced lessons for experienced users. There seems to be almost no in between for middle schoolers and high schoolers. The AP coding sections are too difficult for most students.
JavaScript would be a perfect section. Start with the absolute easiest javascript coding that a 6th grader could do and slowly build it up more and more advanced. only introduce 1 small new concept at a time. It could easily be a whole year course.
A few thing to keep in mind.
Don’t include any downloadable sheets. They rarely work for students.
Every lessons has to have interactive coding. Students will not do any work where they know there is nothing checking them.
Thanks for your feedback. The curriculum writers and developers aren’t much on the forum, but if you want to share this with them, you can always reach out to support@code.org.
They are always looking into new ideas for courses and curriculum to add. Speaking from my years of teaching and working with other teachers, I will say that there are a lot of teachers and students who do benefit from all of the extra support and downloadable resources. The value of the code.org curriculum is that they always try to provide more than enough for every individual to find what THEY need to make their class work and what works for one isn’t always going to work for another and as teachers, we are the ones that are empowered to choose what works best in our situation and for our students.
Game Lab is built on a(n older) version of Javascript as is GameLab and I think they are trying to strike a balance between full-on programming and providing the scaffolding that many teachers and students do need. I have middle school students who are very challenged by the lessons in CS Discoveries and I have others that sail right through, so I understand where you are coming from, but many do appreciate the approach code.org takes and I’m sure if resources were unlimited, they would create more courses with a full programming approach.