Code.Ino: An Educational Game for Arduino Programming with Female Protagonism to Encourage Diversity in STEM

The use of digital games in teaching programming is a powerful strategy to engage students in a playful and meaningful way. By transforming abstract concepts into interactive challenges, games stimulate curiosity, creativity, and logical thinking—elements essential for learning computing. In this context, this article presents the educational digital game Code.Ino for teaching Arduino programming. This game was developed to teach programming playfully to middle and high school students, using female protagonism as a strategy to encourage diversity in STEM (Science Technology Engineering Mathematics). The game features interactive challenges and engaging narratives, divided into ten levels that cover concepts of hardware and software in Arduino, while also highlighting important women in the history of Computing. An initial evaluation with students and teachers showed a positive reception of the tool as an interesting and motivating didactic resource for learning Arduino programming.