About the Author

Stephen J. Wolf, PhD

About the Author

Stephen J. Wolf is a science teacher with a PhD in science education and a penchant for fantasy books, movies, and video games. Growing up, he loved learning how things worked. When he saw Mr. Wizard's World for the first time, he knew then that science was his place to be. From learning about how fireworks light up with different colors to understanding the mechanics of an acid-base reaction, chemistry and physics became his passion.

Stephen started writing in eighth grade when his English teacher challenged the class to craft three different scenes. One scene focused on a person. A second highlighted a location. And the third detailed an object. In the moment of the quick-fire writing prompts, Wolf linked all three tasks together and created his first short story. The following year he created his first novel, then expanded it to a trilogy, growing as a writer along the way.

A Shocking Journey

With some short stories used in his classes, Wolf communicates a love of reading to his students through creative connections between science and magic. His short story, A Shocking Journey, teaches the fundamentals of electricity and magnetism, as experienced by a middle school class, through a series of "magical" experiences that allow the students to visualize the concepts.

Coding

Wolf dabbled in programming throughout his life. From coding BASIC on the Commodore 64 to setting up webpages for his science classes, he always sought out ways to stay involved in technology. As his husband codes in C# for a living, Wolf decided to learn the language. He created an app that allows his honors students to calculate energies for heating curves. But the process of getting the app onto a website was a challenge.

After researching various methods, Wolf decided to delve into JavaScript, which is designed to work with websites directly. He spent the good part of a year learning and practicing until he understood the language well, keeping with standard coding practices in the industry. He then developed and taught an Intro to JavaScript course in his school.

Eager to teach beyond his classroom, Wolf turned his love of coding and writing into two Coding for Kids books. The Room Adventure challenges the reader to create an adventure game, trekking through a house fixing things, while searching for a passcode to exit the house. He also wrote Build Mini Apps, which guides the reader through fifteen coding challenges, all designed to work together to instruct coding concepts.