History of Computers Lesson 5: Turing and the Codebreakers (Enigma, the Bombe, Colossus) - printable lesson, ages 11-14

A ready-to-teach lesson that follows our free video, step by step.

Watch a part. Pause. Talk. Try it. Then press play again.

The story: Alan Turing's 1936 idea of one machine that can do any other machine's job, the Enigma cipher and the Polish and Bletchley Park codebreakers, the Bombe, Zuse's Z3, Colossus, and Turing's question: can machines think?

What you get (12-page printable PDF):

- A one-page guide for the grown-up, with the exact times to pause the video

- Key words, and a "think first" question

- Four pupil pages, one for each part of the video: what we just heard, two questions to talk about, and something to try

- Two worksheets: a paper tape machine to run by hand, a turning-wheel cipher to hide and read words, a "crib" puzzle, a matching task, and a cut-out timeline

- The story in four pictures, and an 8-question quiz

- All the answers, teaching notes, and the sources for every fact

For ages 11 to 14 (works from 9 with help). About 45 minutes. You need pencils, scissors and paper.

Every drawing and every word is our own. The free video is at kitson-workshop.pages.dev/#history

Want to try one first? Lesson 1 (the abacus) is free: payhip.com/b/nmZIE

Pay once, use it for ever: one purchase covers one teacher or one family. Use it as often as you like with your own classes, and print as many copies as your own pupils need. Please do not resell it or pass the file on.

For educational purposes only.