THE FLOOR IS LAVA! It's Game Jam time...

By The Code Zone team 2 min read

Last week we had our first of this Summer's Game Jams, a free event for all members where the children were given a theme (The Floor is Lava) and had to come up with their own game or animation, and wow did they come up with some amazing ideas!  We've selected a few (below) and our mentors have done a round up.  Have a watch below!

 The Floor Is Lava Game Jam

Last week we had our first of this Summer's Game Jams, a free event for all members where the children were given a theme (The Floor is Lava) and had to come up with their own game or animation, and wow did they come up with some amazing ideas!  We've selected a few (below) and our mentors have done a round up.  Have a watch below!
 
All children who took part have also earnt this cool badge for their profile!  A super well done to all of them, there was such enthusiasm and enjoyment (although apologies to the parents who's children were still up in the evening working on their games...we heard stories!)
 
Do encourage your children to share their projects so everyone can have a play (message us if you're unsure how).  All children now have a profile online to show-off their badges and their projects so anyone can have a play!  Check their dashboard for their own unique link to share.
 
So now the children are all warmed up, we're back at it next week for the second Summer Game Jam!  We'll announce the theme on Monday but I can promise one thing... it's going to take some creativity!  Watch this space :)
 
 

Play some of the games that have been shared from this Game Jam...

 

 

 

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How a game jam works

  1. Six to eight weeks of club

    An hour a week, the same mentor, a group of no more than six. Over a term the pieces stack up: events, loops, variables, functions, and whatever else the thing they are building turns out to need.

  2. Then the holidays, and a theme

    We announce a theme and stop there. No brief, no worksheet, and no deadline you can fail. It is the one stretch of the year with an unbroken run at a single idea, which is why most of the building happens here rather than in the term.

  3. Then somebody else plays it

    Finished games go up on our own platform and on this page, where sharing between members is moderated by mentors. Other children play them and award XP. Having a stranger pick up the thing you made is the part that keeps children coming back.

The games our members made

11 games 11 makers 439 XP awarded by other members Built in Scratch

Every one of these is playable in the browser, no account needed. Have a go at a few.

Scratch 77 XP (coding experience points)

the floor is lava maker!

by Olliecroney

This is floor is lava... MAKER where you can make your own levels by clicking and dragging items of furniture to create…

Scratch 63 XP (coding experience points)

The floor is soup!

by MiraGlew

Jump: Space Left and right key arrows : Move Up arrow: Climb ladder Thats all! :D

Scratch 46 XP (coding experience points)

among YOU

by Josh5

About our game jams

A game jam is a themed build: we announce a theme, and children across the clubs spend a few weeks making something from it. There is no brief beyond the theme and nothing to finish by a deadline you can fail. Children share what they made on our own platform, where chat and sharing between members is moderated by mentors.

Jams run alongside the ordinary weekly clubs rather than instead of them. A Game Dev Club session is one hour a week, in a group of no more than six, with the same DBS-checked, STEM-certified mentor each week.

Children build their own games rather than working through a set course, starting in Scratch or MakeCode and moving to Python and TypeScript when they are ready.

Past themes have included Evolution, Elemental Powers, The Wall of Doom and Strange Sports, and the results range from a two-screen platformer to something genuinely strange that only makes sense to its author. Both count. A jam is the one point in the year where the brief is deliberately loose, which is when children who normally follow instructions carefully surprise everybody.

Mentors write a note on every child after every session, which is how we know when somebody is ready to move up a level, or would rather stay where they are. Levels move down as readily as up, so the work always fits.

More than a third of our members are autistic or have ADHD, based on what parents tell us when they join, and in 2025 we received the Autism Inclusion Award from the National Autistic Society.

Children can keep the camera off, type instead of speaking rather than being put on the spot, take a break without it disrupting anyone, and step away and come back.

Jams tend to be where that matters most: a deadline nobody set and a theme nobody has to interpret the same way is a much easier place to take a risk than a classroom is.

Live clubs run online across the UK and in person across Essex, Hertfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Suffolk. Over 1,000 children are enrolled. In 2026 we were ranked second in the UK in Club Hub UK’s Top 100 Children’s Activity Providers, scored by five independent judges on safeguarding, inclusivity and community impact.

More like this

The blog is in two halves. Guides are the evergreen explainers written by the mentors who teach the clubs, covering the questions parents actually ask: what comes after Scratch, how to support a coding-mad child when you cannot code yourself, and what works for autistic and ADHD children.

Club news is the other half, and it is where posts like this one live: game jams, Minecraft builds and weekly roundups, written up by whoever ran the session. Neither is marketing. If you want to know what an hour actually looks like before you book anything, club news is the more honest read of the two.

The first session is a free taster and we do not ask for card details. Book a free taster session, see what it costs, or read about support for neurodivergent children.

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