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Teaching My 5 Year Old Daughter To Code
- freehunter 14y agoLooks like the site is down right now. I'm getting a blank page.
- tocomment 14y agoI remember we had that turtle system (logo?) in third grade. I never once realized I was programming! I thought it was just a dumb game to make a turtle move. And I remember always wishing I could learn how to program a computer at that age. If they had told me that's what I was doing I probably would have been more interested. I guess the moral is to not abstract too much of the system from the child. Maybe they want to see variables, and print statements.
- gkwelding 14y agoGood point but I think for children as young as 5 the RoboMind system works very well. Most kids struggle to read/write at that age and a true programming language would probably be a bit of a struggle.
- notlisted 14y agoThere are two very nice programs on the iPad which my 4yo likes: Move the Turtle http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/move-turtle.-programming-for/id509013878?mt=8 http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/move-turtle.-programming-for/... ($2.99) Similar to the Logo programming language another commenter mentions. Starts simple, but goes into loop solutions a little too quick. Cargo Bot (free!) http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/cargo-bot/id519690804?mt=8 http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/cargo-bot/id519690804?mt=8 Cargo Bot is much more visual, little or no text, but I think they dive into recursion much too fast (for 3 star solutions that is). Bee Bot (free!) http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/bee-bot/id500131639?mt=8 http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/bee-bot/id500131639?mt=8 Just discovered, also for the really little ones. No comments yet.
- notlisted 14y agoPS I see more listed here (should have searched for those two names before posting) http://www.techwithintent.com/2012/07/5-best-ipad-apps-to-teach-programming/ http://www.techwithintent.com/2012/07/5-best-ipad-apps-to-te... A longer list with resources for older kids: http://breakoutmentors.com/kids-programming-resources/ http://breakoutmentors.com/kids-programming-resources/
- gkwelding 14y agoMy wife has an iPad 3, but I have a Nexus 7, any similar tools for that? Anyone?
- notlisted 14y agoI'm far from an Apple fanboy, have an Android phone, but... the best investment I've ever made is an extra iPad for my kid. There's sooo much good stuff for the little ones on the iPad that's really educational. Android is simply lacking in that respect (for now). Case in point, I downloaded some apps, and without any intervention on my part she taught herself how to write letters (little skywriter), do simple math (monkey school math), work with sets (firstapp.com peeps), draw lovely artwork with commentary (doodlecast), learn about physics (amazing alex) etc etc. Nothing better than having her come over to me and "explain" how things work. If you think an iPad is going overboard in terms of expenses, a lot of this stuff works on the iTouch as well.
- gadders 14y agoI might have to give this a go, given that "Computer Studies" these days doesn't seem to teach children to program any more...
- ph0rque 14y agoNeat! Both my daughters, four and six, have been asking me when they can program like daddy :). The six-year-old can read, but the four-year-old cannot. I'm looking forward to trying this later with the older daughter.
- gkwelding 14y agoIt was some good bonding/educational time. She spent an hour sat on my knee playing around with this.
- moistgorilla 14y agoHas anybody considered the idea of stealth teaching young kids rather than forcing them to memorize things? Imagine that instead of watching useless cartoons kids where playing games like this (robomind) and or dragon box. Maybe throw in some strategy games that tell accurate history of the world and some economy games. I just feel like this would be extremely effective in teaching younger minds.
- harryf 14y agoI've tried various means of getting my kids (both under 10) programming and the fundamental hurdle is they don't want to sit at a keyboard long enough to make any progress. 15 minutes is about the limit for attention - if there's no reward, in terms of achieving something, it won't work with kids under 10 IMO. The only successes I've had are Cargobot - the iPad game and http://drtechniko.com/2012/04/09/how-to-train-your-robot/ http://drtechniko.com/2012/04/09/how-to-train-your-robot/ - this is great as its programming without needing computers
- njs12345 14y agoSpacechem might be a game with a similar theme: http://spacechemthegame.com/ http://spacechemthegame.com/
- Scaevolus 14y agoWhile I love Spacechem, it's probably too difficult for young children to enjoy.
- Sakes 14y agoI think you are correct about the short attention spans and need of quick rewards. Here is my strat to combat it. My Son is 2 yrs old, and I want to start teaching programming at 5. 2-3 work on reading 3-4 work on basic math 4-5 work on basic algebra (w/tools like dragon box of course) 5+ start programming strat - find an open source game - start playing it with my son - after a while start modifying the code with my son To sum it up in one sentence... get your child emotionally invested in the environment before trying to show him how to manipulate it.
- Brajeshwar 14y agoYou should check out Scratch too. http://scratch.mit.edu/ http://scratch.mit.edu/
- jbattle 14y agoAnother nice one for kids ... http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/projects/kodu/ http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/projects/kodu/ VERY visually interesting and easy to make things happen Only runs on xbox and windows
- tucif 14y agoI used Kodu with kids between 5-9 years on a summer camp, they caught up very quickly. The interface was pretty cool and straightforward, they loved being able to modify the terrain. I always told them like: "Kodu is hungry and wants to eat some apples", or "can you help Kodu find X", etc. Kodu (the robot) became kind of a character/friend they empathized with, which eased having their attention and interest. Only downside I saw was its cpu and memory consumption.
- srikrishnan 14y agoI believe the right mental model is the first step towards understanding coding or computers. The easiest way to start for a kid might be with something that interests them - like creating shapes/graphics. (I am grateful for my school introducing me to programming via logo when I was nine) I've been at it 2 weeks now trying to teach my grandma how a computer works. She now understands how a processor works, what is a software program, etc. I made my grandma dictate code to make me dance giving her exactly 4 commands (moves) I could take (I am a 2-bit processor ;) ). We had fun! Ha. So she coded. No computers. I could also explain processor speed, n-bit processors, different instruction sets, instructions that need operands, etc. Of course I used none of these words.
- gkwelding 14y agoThe first comedy response to this article: http://betabeat.com/2012/10/unsuspecting-5-year-old-girl-being-stealth-prepared-for-a-grueling-life-of-coding/ http://betabeat.com/2012/10/unsuspecting-5-year-old-girl-bei...
- cinbun8 14y agoI tried to teach my nephew to code with python. He is 7. It didnt stick on the first attempt. However when I showed him how to use a for loop, he printed a multiplication table, turned around to his mom and exclaimed 'homework done' ! :)
- bsaunder 14y agoI think visual feedback is very important in teaching kids how to program. Several months ago, I installed Alice (v2.2) (http://www.alice.org/ http://www.alice.org/) for my kids to explore. They generally enjoyed it but the UI was a bit cumbersome in some respects. Looks like there's a new version that seems worth upgrading to.
- delinka 14y agoIs there a setting to change the UI to English? I can muddle through a few things but I feel I'm missing out.
- gkwelding 14y agoYeah, click on the big red spot in the top left corner. Go to settings. It's the first drop-down box.
- CapnGoat 14y agoDoes that actually work for you? I've been setting it to English and restarting the app about 5 times now and it still launches in Dutch.
- notlisted 14y agoUse the keyboard. Mouse fails for me as well (Mac). Eye -> Instellingen -> Taal -> Click on dropdown to open it. Scroll UP to English (silly Dutchies) -> Press Enter You may also want to adjust the Scriptdefinitie field to en in a similar fashion. I left it on nl for the samples, will update it later once I've checked them out (and not a problem since I'm Dutch anyhow). I think this tool fails a little because of the language dependency. Move the Turtle is more language independent, and Cargo Bot (links above) needs no language at all. Actually, I LOVE cargo bot myself, very challenging.
- SamuelMulder 14y agoAs other comments have mentioned, Scratch is great for younger children. I've had some success teaching basic Scratch concepts to 5 year olds, although they vary a lot in willingness to play with it. If nothing else, showing them the cool set of sprites and showing them how to make fun backgrounds will keep them entertained enough to start introducing programming concepts. It helped that I was working with a group, so the kids having more trouble could see the neat things some of the others were doing to get them motivated. By 7, they should be able to work with pretty much all the fundamental tools in Scratch and you can start introducing them to higher order constructs. I've found that for young kids the social aspect can be very motivating. If she has friends of a similar age, get them all started on it and they'll soon be showing each other what they come up with. If that doesn't work, then you provide the social reinforcement :)
- drbawb 14y agoDitto for the social aspect. For me, I was a bit older [6th-8th graders], but my social experience was FIRST Lego League [FLL]. Basically, the FIRST robotics competition also sponsors competitions for middle schoolers to build LEGO robots using the Mindstorms kit [when I did it, it came with the yellow RCX "brain", now they use the NXT and some more advanced sensors/motors]. The social aspect helped bind our team's programmers & "hardware engineers" together. I was always terrible at building things w/o direction, and some kids weren't great at programming. However, when you all have to work together, you start looking at each other for guidance. Seeing the robot take shape eventually led me to learn about gearing and transmissions. Other kids weren't great at programming, but when you see your hardware do wildly unexpected things, you stop and ask "woah, wait, why did it do that? [programmer], show me why it did that!" -- When they see their hardware misbehave, they start to learn what the power of software really is, and vice versa. That and it's a great precursor to FIRST, which I regrettably never got to participate in.
- pbhjpbhj 14y agoI've been trying to get my lad in to Scratch. The OP's app looks to be like Logo Turtle which was taught to me as a child in the UK c.1984. Indeed IIRC most schools in my area had this and some [later?] had a real-life 'turtle' that you could move around (connected by a long Centronics cable I think). There was a toy called Big Track (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0035IZ85G?ie=UTF8&camp=213733&creative=393177&creativeASIN=B0035IZ85G&linkCode=shr&tag=flapjacktasti-20&qid=1349389623&sr=8-1&keywords=big+track http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0035IZ85G?ie=UTF8&camp... : aff) that allowed small sets of serialised instructions to be entered. Robosapiens are probably the modern equivalent.
- p_sherman 14y agoWhy would you want to force something on a child that young? Why would you want to basically indoctrinate your child with something? How about, instead, developing reasoning skills and the ability to make their own decisions and then actually letting them decide what they want to do? Crazy, I know!
- notlisted 14y agoYou underestimate children and you underestimate the contribution programming (structured thinking) can make in a child's development. It's all about exposure... if you don't show them anything, they won't discover what they like. Do you have children? I get the feeling you're talking from a theoretical perspective here... They're sponges. I say we "soak 'em" don't let them dry up.