When I was teaching myself web programming, I wrote a blog (in PHP), then an image gallery (in PHP), then somehow I landed a job doing PHP programming (back aro

When I was teaching myself web programming, I wrote a blog (in PHP), then an image gallery (in PHP), then somehow I landed a job doing PHP programming (back around 2000ish) and wrote a bunch of sites for them. Then I decided I hated PHP and went to Python, and that was where my fascination for static HTML generators developed. Now my website, blog, and photo gallery are all static HTML (apart from the ajax twitter-based comments), which I find pretty awesome, but not really that web appy any more :) Anyway my point is, start simple but not too simple. A challenge is good. A blog system is a pretty good start, since it introduces the mainstays of web programming (databases, forms, comments, etc.). Instant gratification is good. Then let your students find something they want to build.