I think it'd be more apt to choose something like Racket. It has all the desirable characteristics the author finds attractive in Javascript. It is an integrate

I think it'd be more apt to choose something like Racket. It has all the desirable characteristics the author finds attractive in Javascript. It is an integrated environment and includes libraries and extensions for teaching basic programming. Unlike Javascript it isn't married to the browser (and by extension, the DOM) and doesn't suffer from a variety of syntactical discrepancies. It even comes with a free book for teaching the fundamentals of computer programming and computation. http://docs.racket-lang.org/quick/ http://docs.racket-lang.org/quick/ Update: All of the desire-able characteristics except for being a resume-search keyword with a high hit frequency. IMO, learning how to program and getting a job are orthogonal.