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I was learning C when I was six years old. Definitely helped that my older brother (then 11) was the one teaching me— I wonder if having young children learn fr

by Cushman 16y ago

I was learning C when I was six years old. Definitely helped that my older brother (then 11) was the one teaching me— I wonder if having young children learn from older children might be good advice in general?

binomial 16y ago
It's possible great advice. See these two TED Talks by Sugata Mitra for evidence: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xRb7_ffl2D0 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xRb7_ffl2D0 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dk60sYrU2RU http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dk60sYrU2RU
ig1 16y ago
I first coded when I was about the same age, but at that point it was mostly type out programs from magazines and making minor tweaks (this was in Atari Basic). When I was 9-10 I was writing my own simple games in Amiga Basic and later CanDo. When I was 13 I started learning K&R C and then later Quest-C (A VB like tool for C). I remember there was one other kid in my year at school who was better at C than me at the time, so I don't think I was that unusual. I think it easy to underestimate what kids are capable of.
- jlees 16y ago
  I was typing out BASIC programs when I was around 6, got to love growing up with the Spectrum/C64 and the wonderful BBC Micro. I think it worked well; I still remember it being so magical (a since overused word sadly), and a lot of my early tweaking was PEEKing and POKEing around in games to cheat. The OP has it right -- if you're doing something you want (building a Dr Who game, changing your high score, turning all the baddies into strawberries, making a spider run around the screen to scare your mum) that's the best, dare I say only, way to learn. Having said this, nobody at my school could program at all (despite the BBC's best efforts). I didn't learn "real" programming until university; web scripting and PHP before that. Maybe that's why I'm such a hacky coder even now.

by Cushman 16y ago

binomial 16y ago

It's possible great advice. See these two TED Talks by Sugata Mitra for evidence: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xRb7_ffl2D0 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xRb7_ffl2D0 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dk60sYrU2RU http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dk60sYrU2RU

ig1 16y ago

I first coded when I was about the same age, but at that point it was mostly type out programs from magazines and making minor tweaks (this was in Atari Basic). When I was 9-10 I was writing my own simple games in Amiga Basic and later CanDo. When I was 13 I started learning K&R C and then later Quest-C (A VB like tool for C). I remember there was one other kid in my year at school who was better at C than me at the time, so I don't think I was that unusual. I think it easy to underestimate what kids are capable of.

jlees 16y ago
I was typing out BASIC programs when I was around 6, got to love growing up with the Spectrum/C64 and the wonderful BBC Micro. I think it worked well; I still remember it being so magical (a since overused word sadly), and a lot of my early tweaking was PEEKing and POKEing around in games to cheat. The OP has it right -- if you're doing something you want (building a Dr Who game, changing your high score, turning all the baddies into strawberries, making a spider run around the screen to scare your mum) that's the best, dare I say only, way to learn. Having said this, nobody at my school could program at all (despite the BBC's best efforts). I didn't learn "real" programming until university; web scripting and PHP before that. Maybe that's why I'm such a hacky coder even now.