Re: What Language for a kid

[Brian St. Pierre]

I just recently discovered MIT App Inventor --
http://appinventor.mit.edu/explore/front.html

It's Scratch embedded into a web-based environment that updates an app
running on your Android device in real-time. I've only played with it for
about 10 minutes, but it "just worked" to get a quick "hello"
text-to-speech app running on my device.

--
Brian St. Pierre

On Wed, Dec 23, 2015 at 11:24 AM, Kenny Lussier  wrote:

> Hi All,
>
> My daughter has expressed an interest in learning to code. It's a
> non-specific, very general interest. She doesn't have a specific area of
> interest that she wants to learn (UI, game development, HPC, etc.), she
> just want to learn how to code.
>
> What do people think is the best language for a 12yr old to learn? What is
> most flexible to use for different purposes? What tools are out there to
> teach a kid to code? Code Academy and the like seem to be a little dry and
> never yielded wonderful results for most of the adults I know, so other
> ideas would be welcome.
>
> Thanks,
> Kenny
>
>
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>
>
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Re: What Language for a kid

[Paul Beaudet]

I've never used labview or the newest version off mindstorm, so honestly
these programs could be completely relevant I could be completely out of
touch.

The big point is, making programing accessible is great if it can be used
practically and the programer identifies him or herself as having become a
programer. The later of which is important in this instance. Not the
programing bit, the self identifying bit, the confidence and feeling of
empowerment in creation and solving issues. Those are the core reasons I
would like to see programing taught more as opposed to programing for jobs
sake. Think about training wheels on a bike, watch this kid figure out how
to ride without them - > https://youtu.be/eaIvk1cSyG8. It hardly matters if
this little guy is going to become a pro cyclist or not. What matters is he
has discovered that he is empowered to do something if he believes in
himself and works hard.

The reason any of us want to pass programing on to others, is because we
have found that sense of empowerment for ourselves and would like to help
others to find it in the same place. As Mentors, Teachers, and or Parents I
think we are responsible for helping overcome some of the barriers that the
complexity of programing presents. Pointing to the training wheel
equivalent here alarms me we may be overlooking the key objective, which is
inspiration for a young person. Which in the case of "Thumbs up kid" came
from his Dad helping him get to his epiphany. The bike or the programing
language or the color of the bike are all ancillary.

The other big opportunities with code is the trivial cost of failure and
relatively unbound access to resources. How relevant would training wheels
be if falling down didn't hurt. Of course getting the balance is important
but that is why we are in the picture. On the resources side of things
before really getting into code I had a poor perspective of what could
really be done. Shedding light on possibilities and scale at little cost I
think can be an inspiration thing. Codeacademy and Khan start and such a
basic level it's hard to see the forest through the trees. Here me right, I
think they are great tools, I just personally found them frustrating
because of the great amount of time taken mucking through the weeds or
things that were already understood.

I did like this intro to python ebook ->
https://inventwithpython.com/chapters/. But, again recommendations are just
details, could also recommend JavaScript at this point because of the
resources available. Really all depends on the ( irrelevant but necessary )
objectives.

Thumbs up everybody!

On Thu, Dec 24, 2015 at 10:15 AM, Alan Johnson  wrote:

> My son (age 10) and I are learning Python together on
> https://www.codecademy.com/ here and there.  They have a bunch of
> languages there with a very similar style to https://www.khanacademy.org/
> .   We have not finished the course yet, so I don't know if it will get
> advanced enough for my preferences, but it is great for beginner
> programmers.  He has years of experience with Mindstorm GUI programming,
> and that is a great intro to basic programing concepts because it has
> programming instructions that are just like building Legos, but I agree
> with others that is not very representative of programming in general; it
> is down right painful to debug among other shortcomings.  So I'm hoping get
> him to switch to Python for Mindstorm
> .
> Also, then we can get rid of this last Windows machine in the house. =)
>
>
> On Wed, Dec 23, 2015 at 11:24 AM, Kenny Lussier 
> wrote:
>
>> Hi All,
>>
>> My daughter has expressed an interest in learning to code. It's a
>> non-specific, very general interest. She doesn't have a specific area of
>> interest that she wants to learn (UI, game development, HPC, etc.), she
>> just want to learn how to code.
>>
>> What do people think is the best language for a 12yr old to learn? What
>> is most flexible to use for different purposes? What tools are out there to
>> teach a kid to code? Code Academy and the like seem to be a little dry and
>> never yielded wonderful results for most of the adults I know, so other
>> ideas would be welcome.
>>
>> Thanks,
>> Kenny
>>
>>
>> ___
>> gnhlug-discuss mailing list
>> gnhlug-discuss@mail.gnhlug.org
>> http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss/
>>
>>
>
>
> --
> Alan Johnson
> a...@datdec.com
> Date Format PSA 
>
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>
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Re: What Language for a kid

[Alan Johnson]

My son (age 10) and I are learning Python together on
https://www.codecademy.com/ here and there.  They have a bunch of languages
there with a very similar style to https://www.khanacademy.org/ .   We have
not finished the course yet, so I don't know if it will get advanced enough
for my preferences, but it is great for beginner programmers.  He has years
of experience with Mindstorm GUI programming, and that is a great intro to
basic programing concepts because it has programming instructions that are
just like building Legos, but I agree with others that is not very
representative of programming in general; it is down right painful to debug
among other shortcomings.  So I'm hoping get him to switch to Python for
Mindstorm
.
Also, then we can get rid of this last Windows machine in the house. =)


On Wed, Dec 23, 2015 at 11:24 AM, Kenny Lussier  wrote:

> Hi All,
>
> My daughter has expressed an interest in learning to code. It's a
> non-specific, very general interest. She doesn't have a specific area of
> interest that she wants to learn (UI, game development, HPC, etc.), she
> just want to learn how to code.
>
> What do people think is the best language for a 12yr old to learn? What is
> most flexible to use for different purposes? What tools are out there to
> teach a kid to code? Code Academy and the like seem to be a little dry and
> never yielded wonderful results for most of the adults I know, so other
> ideas would be welcome.
>
> Thanks,
> Kenny
>
>
> ___
> gnhlug-discuss mailing list
> gnhlug-discuss@mail.gnhlug.org
> http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss/
>
>


-- 
Alan Johnson
a...@datdec.com
Date Format PSA 
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