OP here. You're right that SpriteBox does not exist to teach kids to be great coders. It exists to get as many kids as possible engaged with what programming is

OP here. You're right that SpriteBox does not exist to teach kids to be great coders. It exists to get as many kids as possible engaged with what programming is and excited to learn more. Especially kids who may not be 'naturally inclined' to code. What makes your argument fall flat is, we already had LightBot: it teaches kids to program with icons only. If text was a blocker for SpriteBox, why would we pursue it at all? You end by saying that kids who fear text are not well suited for coding. That's like saying kids who fear symbols are not well suited to math. This kind of sentiment is what drives people to believe that they should give up things that they may excel at given enough time and interest. SpriteBox, like many coding apps, is about sparking that interest. As for text, the real reason we tackle that is because there's a real gap for people between icons and textual programming: some people have this disconnect between what they perceive coding is. Is visual coding "real"? Are formulas in excel "coding"? These are answers programmers can answer, but not people unfamiliar with code.