What is HTML? Definition, Uses, Structure, and Importance

May 13, 2022

HTML is used to create pages and make them functional, and most websites are written in HTML. It allows web users to create and structure headings, sections, paragraphs, links, and more using elements, tags, and attributes. However, you must note that HTML is not wholly considered a programming language. HTML has to be supported by other languages like JavaScript to add dynamic features.

What is HTML?

HTML stands for Hypertext Markup Language and was first created by Tim Berners-Lee, Robert Cailliau, and others starting in 1989. Let us discuss what HTML is. To start with, HTML helps if you know what you are writing.

Also, to make HTML visually appealing, we use CSS, which stands for Cascading Style Sheet. We will focus on how beginners, especially kids, can learn HTML.

HTML has a lot of use cases, namely:

Web development

Developers use HTML code to design how browsers display web page elements, such as text, hyperlinks, and media files.

Internet navigation

Users can easily navigate and insert links between related pages and websites as HTML is heavily used to embed hyperlinks.

Web documentation

HTML makes it possible to organize and format documents, similarly to Microsoft Word.

Why Should You Teach Your Kid HTML?

HTML codes 90% of websites. The knowledge of HTML helps kids learn other programming languages in the future.

Among all the languages available, HTML is relatively easy to learn, making it a great place for kids to start their coding journey. HTML has no fixed number of HTML tags. However, based on the web development program, the number can usually lie between 80 and 150. Most of these tags are beginner-friendly, and kids can easily learn how to use these tags.

This is why HTML is a fantastic skill that elementary and middle school-aged children must learn. HTML being an easy language, kids can build their websites, boost their confidence, elevate their interest in learning harder programming languages, and set them up for early success. It takes little time and effort to teach how to code in HTML, which makes it easy for both the kids and the parents/teachers.

What can your child do with HTML?

Web platforms like WordPress convert normal text into HTML, but the knowledge of HTML is still extremely useful even when creating websites from scratch. You don’t want your kids to be restricted only to already available template layouts or color palettes. You surely want your kids to build websites using their imagination. HTML gives your kids the perfect platform to create customized websites that suit their tastes and, in the future, their customers’ tastes too.

If you want your kids to start learning to program and be able to code, HTML is the best language to start with. It’s easy and rewarding. Though HTML isn’t a programming language, the fundamentals such as nesting can be learned. Hence, kids can easily transition into advanced programming languages like Java or Python after learning HTML and CSS.

Learn HTML Basic Structure

The basic HTML structure consists of three parts. You can think of these as the “building blocks” of a web page. They are:

HTML version declaration
Heading(s)
Body

HTML version declaration is the first line that denotes the used HTML version. There are currently five versions, and the latest version used by most users is HTML5.

Every HTML document begins and ends with the <html> tag. This tells the browser that the following document is an HTML file.

The <head> tag contains the title of the document. It also has other general information about the file, like the author, copyright, keywords, and descriptions of what appears on the page.

The title tag is within the <head> tags and is used to give the page’s title. Make sure that it is not more than 20 words in length.

The main content of your page is placed within the body tags. Here goes your text, images, links, tables, and everything else

Tags/Elements

The angled brackets <… > in HTML are called tags. Inside these tags are words or letters that tell the computer what to do. For example, <hbr> tells the browser to break and go to the next line. These words or letters are called elements.

What are the most used HTML tags?

After analyzing several websites, we know for a fact that the link or anchor tag is the most used tag of all. In fact, it represents almost 25% of all tags on the web. Here are some of the most used tags:

<a> for link
<b> to make bold text
<strong> for bold text with emphasis
<body> main HTML part
<br> for break
<div> it is a division or part of an HTML document
<h1>… for titles
<i> to make an italic text
<img> for images in document
<ol> is an ordered list, <ul> for an unordered list
<li> is a list item in bulleted (ordered list)
<p> for paragraph

How to learn HTML?

HTML learning is easier than you think. Programming lets you be creative, and learning HTML enables your kids to express themselves through code. Here are some tips and tricks that will help you excite your kids to learn HTML and CSS.

Coding can sometimes be difficult to teach to kids. Some kids find coding, let’s say, boring. The trick here is to get kids excited about learning HTML by comparing it to something they think is cool and fun. When you are teaching your child to code, you need to develop interesting ideas. You can use cute highlighters if your kids love to color and then gradually teach your children color codes in HTML where they can play with different colors.

Another way to explain to your kids the HTML code is to draw a sketch and then help them design a website that matches the sketch. You can also let your kids write one long paragraph of words. Explain to them that piece of paper is the internet without HTML: dull and difficult to read. Now give your kids highlighters. Tell them to make words stand out, strike them out, underline them, or italicize them. Learn HTML’s formatting tags (like <STRONG> and <STYLE>) work the same way, making the plain text more interesting.

HTML for Kids – Start with Basics

Decide your text editor

Be sure you have a text editor that your kids feel is easy to work with. You can use the built-in notepad or notepad++, or even level up and try Atom.

Think of an outline

Before you start to code, you first need to draw a simple skeleton of what you want your website to look and feel like. HTML is like a summary with bullet points and strict order. Your kids can do this the old-fashioned way – scribble it down on paper.

Add the basic HTML structure

You can begin with the correct HTML structure that is the heading, then add the body. Don’t forget to double-check if you’ve used the right tags. Add a few elements such as:<html>, <header>, <title>, <body>.

Add simple content, like “Hello World.”

Experiment with different tags and attributes. A short phrase like this is easiest for beginners. This can be as simple as “Hello World” or “I love Coding.”

Open the HTML file in your browser

Right-click on the file and select “Open with.” You’ll be able to choose from the available browser you have. Select the browser and enjoy your beautiful website!

Learn HTML Heading

Headings are written in HTML using the following elements:

<h1>
<h2>
<h3>
<h4>
<h5>
<h6>

As you might expect, h1> and h2> should be used for the most important titles, with the remaining tags used for subheadings and less important text.

When determining which information on a page is most important, search engine bots use this order.

Things To Avoid

When writing HTML code, do not use Microsoft Word or any other word processor. Text editors as basic as your machine’s built-in notepad is suitable for the task.

The second thing you must be careful about is your browser, such as Chrome and Firefox, to preview your upcoming creation. Your website’s front-end view will vary from browser to browser.

Pros and Cons of HTML

HTML has its pros and cons, just like any other computer language

Pros:

HTML is Beginner-friendly as it has a clean and consistent markup.
Support. If your kid is struck white coding, there are a lot of resources and a large community to help you and your kid solve errors while coding.
HTML is very flexible as it allows you to integrate with backend languages such as PHP and Node.js easily.
Accessible. HTML is open-source and freely available.

Cons:

Static. HTML is primarily used for static web pages. For dynamic functionality, you may need to take the help of other languages like JavaScript or PHP.
Users have to create separate individual web pages for HTML.
There are times when the older browsers don’t render newer tags. Not all Browser versions are compatible with all HTML code.

How Hard Is It to Learn HTML?

HTML is one of the simplest front-end programming languages to learn. So, if you want to learn HTML, go ahead and do it! With time and practice, you’ll be able to make the most of this widely spoken language.