A Female Ahead of Her Time: Ada Lovelace Cracks the Code

Ada Lovelace Cracks the Code, a nonfiction narrative written by Corinne Purtill with the cover and inside illustrations by Marina Muun and the cover lettering by Monique Aimee, is an eye-opening look at Lovelace's perspective in a period of history that changed the course of the world as we know it.  My daughter and I loved reading this book aloud and marveling at Ada's story!

Ada Lovelace was born into privilege since her father was the world-famous poet, Lord Byron.  But she was not interested in that type of life.  She wanted to study math and flight.  Living in England in the early to mid 1800s didn't offer Ada the chance to do it on her own so she made friends with like-minded people.  One person, Charles Babbage, was working on a Difference Machine and Analytical Engine.  Ada helped him with it and foresaw the large number of possibilities it had.

When she alerted Babbage to this notion, he scoffed and told her to keep her imagination to herself.

Due to the lack of respect women had in scientific fields Ada kept her ideas to herself.  She did continue to follow the industrial revolution and was excited about the possibilities these technological breakthroughs could have on people's lives.  Towards the end of her life she took Babbage to the Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations.  Readers can study this and other Great Exhibitions to learn about the ideas that we see today.

At the end of the book is a surprising section of coding activities for readers to try based on Ada's computational thinking:

The activities are all written by the Wogrammer organization that aims to increase women's accomplishment in the sciences.  They have a podcast if you want to listen to their topics.

Another notable aspect of this book are the fanciful illustrations sprinkled throughout the text.  Each chapter opens up with clues to the next part of Ada's journey so the reader can infer what could be happening next.

Finally, readers can consider the relationships that Ada formed and how those affected her life.   Starting with her mother and her absent father.  How did those change over the story?  Can readers relate to having adults in their lives push them in one direction that they don't want to explore?  Ada's relationship with Charles Babbage is also one that is relatable to many readers.  How many times have they had to work with someone on a project where they differed in their approach to the task?  Teamwork, collaboration, reaching consensus are all parts of Ada's story that connect to our lives today.  Readers can think about what they would do in Ada's shoes when Babbage refused to see her vision for the machines they were designing? 

This is a must-have book for elementary and middle school-aged readers because it's engaging and offers a real model of a female scientist who pushed against gender norms to pursue her interests. I'm looking forward to reading more from the Rebel Girls series to add to our biography & STEM collections.