(WKBN) — Learning to code is not easy, but some Valley students made it look extremely easy through Lego robots.

The coding was part of a project with Youngstown State University. It involved a dozen students from the Rich Center for Autism and Potential Development. The idea was to challenge children with autism to see if they were able to code by following directions and working with computers.

“Once you get it figured out and learn more about it and study it, you can pretty much be pretty much good at the back of your hand,” said middle-school student Nick Lakatos.

The students learned to use touch, color, sound and distance to move the robots along a course.

“So you have to press a button to make your robot move. And that’s how you get it to move,” said middle-school student Kiyah Thomas.

“The challenge was met. They took it. They actually were able to teach me things that I didn’t know about coding. I was learning with them at the same time,” said Mike Bettura, a teacher at Potential Development.

The Lego Robot Programming Showcase was a chance for the students to show off their robots and celebrate the behind-the-keyboard work they had done to get them to move.

The students were wearing medals for their achievements.

“I love this medal. I got one last year. I think it’s really cool,” Thomas said.

“A dream. A dream. Not every day someone gets a medal,” Lakatos said.

The program was started two years ago.