Elmgrove School pupil Tegan Mitchell-Borley (8) was among four members of the Mosgiel Code Club who showed about 20 university students how to use Scratch, a computer programming tool which allows users to create interactive stories, games and animations, and share them in the online community.
University of Otago media, film and communication studies lecturer Dr Anne Begg invited Tegan, her 14-year-old brother and Taieri College pupil Trent, Silverstream School pupil Robert Hannaford (11) and Elmgrove pupil Aiden Smith (10) to demonstrate their skills in her lecture.
''The programming language these young ones are using is a really good introduction to coding, and although my students aren't expected to be able to code, it's good for them to have a clue about what it is ...
''They need to understand how coding works to understand how algorithmic systems work on the internet, and therefore how the internet works.''
Dr Begg hoped the one-off lecture would be memorable for her students.
Media and communications student Jeanie Pattison and film and media student Jessie Cottrell said it was.
''It's not every day you get taught by kids,'' Miss Pattison said.
''I think we can learn a lot from them because they've grown up in a world where it comes more naturally to them.
''It's very easy for them - they speak in a digital language.''
Miss Cottrell said coding was now part of the school curriculum, unlike ''in our day''.
''It's pretty incredible that they can come in and show us uni students how to work something like that.''
Dr Begg said she invited the young coders to the university after seeing an ODT article about their success, helping to break the Moonhack record for the number of coders programming in a 24-hour period.
They were among 28,575 coders from 56 countries who helped set the record last week.
