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Thirty days, twenty minutes a day, zero cost, and by the end your child has built a quiz game, a website and a tiny app they can show anyone. Here is the complete plan, with what to do each day and the exact moment most kids quit.
Rules of the challenge
- Twenty minutes a day. Set a timer. Stopping on time matters more than finishing the task.
- Every day ends with something that runs, even if it is three lines.
- Miss a day, don't skip it. Do it the next day and shift the plan. Missing two in a row is where most children quit, so protect day two.
- A parent sees the result on days 7, 14, 21 and 30. Two minutes each time. This is not optional.
You need a laptop or desktop, free Python from python.org, and a free code editor (Thonny for Class 6–7, VS Code for Class 8+). That's it.
Week 1: Think like a programmer (Days 1–7)
Day 1. Install Python and print your name. Then print it ten times. Yes, ten separate lines. Feel the pain; it is the point.
Day 2. Learn the loop. Print your name ten times in two lines. Then a hundred times.
Day 3. Variables. Store your age, print how old you'll be in 10 years.
Day 4. Input. Ask the user their name and greet them.
Day 5. Conditions. Ask for a number, say whether it is odd or even.
Day 6. Combine: ask five maths questions, count correct answers.
Day 7. Show-and-tell. Run the Day 6 quiz for a parent. Write down one thing to improve.
Week 2: Build a real game (Days 8–14)
Day 8. Random numbers. Make the computer pick a number from 1 to 100.
Day 9. Guessing game: the user guesses, the program says higher or lower.
Day 10. Count the guesses. Print a score.
Day 11. Add three difficulty levels.
Day 12. Save the best score to a text file. (This is where it becomes a real program.)
Day 13. Polish: clear messages, no crashes on bad input.
Day 14. Show-and-tell. A parent plays your game. Ask them what confused them and fix one thing.
Week 3: Your first website (Days 15–21)
Day 15. Create index.html with a heading and a paragraph about you. Open it in a browser.
Day 16. Add an image and three links to things you like.
Day 17. Add a stylesheet. Change the font, colours and spacing.
Day 18. Make a second page about your Week 2 game and link the two pages.
Day 19. Make it look decent on a phone (one media query is enough).
Day 20. Put it on GitHub Pages so it has a real address. Our GitHub guide walks through it.
Day 21. Show-and-tell. Send the link to a relative. Watch them open it on their phone.
Week 4: A tiny useful app (Days 22–30)
Pick one of these and build it over nine days:
- Homework tracker: add tasks, mark them done, save to a file.
- Marks analyser: enter marks per subject, get average, highest, lowest and a grade.
- Expense tracker: log pocket-money spending and show totals by category.
Days 22–24. Plan on paper: what does the user type, what does the program show? Then build the simplest version that works.
Days 25–27. Add saving to a file, and one feature you personally want.
Days 28–29. Write a README: what it does, how to run it, one screenshot. Push it to GitHub.
Day 30. Demo day. Present all three projects to the family in five minutes. Take a photo. You have a portfolio.
What to do on Day 31
Most children who finish this challenge want more structure, harder projects and someone to ask when they are stuck. That is exactly what a live batch provides. CodeMasti places students by a free scholarship test, not by age, so a Class 6 student who completes this plan may start in BUILDERS alongside older students. Check what your child's class typically learns at coding classes by school class, or apply for the free test.
The point of thirty days is not the code. It is discovering that twenty minutes a day, kept, beats three hours once a month, promised.
Written by CodeMasti
The people who teach CodeMasti's live classes for Class 5–12. Last updated 25 Sept 2026.
Next step
Turn reading into a plan for your child
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