Learning tech skills can be hard. What if we could gamify it in a way that made it interesting to learn, and kept kids generally interested? Capture the Flag challenges do exactly that, and they work for kids and adults alike.

We'll start with what a Capture the Flag is, focusing on Jeopardy-style challenges that are approachable if you're new to this. Most of the two hours is you working challenges yourself while I walk the room, and they get harder as you go, so there's room to run if you already write code.

When you get stuck, and you will, we'll talk about what to do next: what to look up, what to try, and how to tell a dead end from something you just haven't cracked yet. That's the part nobody really teaches you, and it's what you should walk out with, a way to approach problems you've never seen before.

Bring a laptop, you'll need it.