Nodeschool is an open source project run by volunteers with two goals: to create high quality programming curriculum and to host community learning events.
The curriculum is composed of open source "workshops" (interactive tutorials) that teach web development skills. Nodeschool events consist of working through one or more workshops as a group. Nodeschool provides various resources for hosting your own event.
Node is an open source project designed to help you write JavaScript programs that talk to networks, file systems or other I/O (input/output, reading/writing) sources.
JavaScript is the defacto programming language of the web. JavaScript used to be "limited" to running within web browsers, but node let's you create server-side applications. In other words, with node you can use JavaScript to write code for both the front-end (browser) and back-end (on the server).
More importantly, node programming can be quite fun. In addition to creating web and network apps, you can use node for ...
- game development (e.g., building your own minecraft-style worlds)
- controlling a quadcopter
- programming your own set of modular micro-controllers.
Finally, node has a thriving developer ecosystem. The node community is growing worldwide and even has a decent regional presence.
If you're at all interested in getting a taste of JavaScript as a language, I'd recommend JavaScript For Cats, a tutorial introduction for new programmers. If you'd like a better understanding of node, I'd recommend the first section of The Art of Node.