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Each of my children started coding through Minecraft and Scratch, so I think that is a good path. I tend to let them pursue (or not) their own interests so I ju

Each of my children started coding through Minecraft and Scratch, so I think that is a good path. I tend to let them pursue (or not) their own interests so I just make resources available to them. It's worth emphasizing to your child the distinction between 'technology exposure' tutorials, and creative work as children tend to care more about making stuff and can find some tutorials a bit tedious. Luckily there are some high quality tutorials out there now, the mid-range and lower quality tutorials will just frustrate them. Related to that, I would advise you to not let them enroll in any 'technology' classes in school as that will kill their interest since the educators will likely be underwhelming. Also, at a certain age, if you give them too much attention for their interests they will stop pursuing it, so enjoy the next few years :)

deleted 6y ago
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MyHypatia 6y ago
Can you provide links of some of the high quality tutorials you have found?
- itronitron 6y ago
  Arduino Starter Kit is very good. CodeHS is also good but expensive for families as they tend to sell to schools. YouTube is also a good resource for some things. We haven't found any good programming books yet although they did enjoy the 'Lauren Ipsum' book.
lmilcin 6y ago
Electronics is my hobby and I am fortunate to have decently equipped electronics lab all with a dedicated desk. So I was pretty worried when he came asking to get him signed up for a robotics class (3h every Saturday for couple of months). I already have some ideas how I want to introduce him to robotics but I am not going to intervene here. Just made sure he knows he can always come back and tell me he is no longer interested in the classes and we will just cut it. As to creative work, I figured out already it is better if I do most of figuring out how to solve some problems (and let him solve just enough to not get bored with it) and he is spending time figuring out what kind of features we want in the games, for example. We then discuss what is and what is not feasible and how things can be working and I still try to make sure he understands how the program works. I know he understands at least some of it because he can take educated guesses at how to modify the program to change it to do what he wants. This seems to be really fun for him so I plan for it to stay that way for some time.

deleted 6y ago

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MyHypatia 6y ago

Can you provide links of some of the high quality tutorials you have found?

itronitron 6y ago
Arduino Starter Kit is very good. CodeHS is also good but expensive for families as they tend to sell to schools. YouTube is also a good resource for some things. We haven't found any good programming books yet although they did enjoy the 'Lauren Ipsum' book.

lmilcin 6y ago

Electronics is my hobby and I am fortunate to have decently equipped electronics lab all with a dedicated desk. So I was pretty worried when he came asking to get him signed up for a robotics class (3h every Saturday for couple of months). I already have some ideas how I want to introduce him to robotics but I am not going to intervene here. Just made sure he knows he can always come back and tell me he is no longer interested in the classes and we will just cut it. As to creative work, I figured out already it is better if I do most of figuring out how to solve some problems (and let him solve just enough to not get bored with it) and he is spending time figuring out what kind of features we want in the games, for example. We then discuss what is and what is not feasible and how things can be working and I still try to make sure he understands how the program works. I know he understands at least some of it because he can take educated guesses at how to modify the program to change it to do what he wants. This seems to be really fun for him so I plan for it to stay that way for some time.