3 ms·
Most challenges faced across the global are cultural and linguistic in nature. The heavy dependence on English is a huge barrier to most children and young adul
by why-el 14y ago
Most challenges faced across the global are cultural and linguistic in nature. The heavy dependence on English is a huge barrier to most children and young adults out there. All my attempts to introduce young cousins and nephews to coding failed because they are at the stage where anything not in their own tongue is unfathomable. I looked into making a small ny-own-dialect-based mini language but it seemed that a better approach is to simply translate existing well designed and well maintained efforts such as Alice. Any idea on how to begin doing that or whether a similar translation project is underway?
- dragonwriter 14y ago> All my attempts to introduce young cousins and nephews to coding failed because they are at the stage where anything not in their own tongue is unfathomable. I looked into making a small ny-own-dialect-based mini language but it seemed that a better approach is to simply translate existing well designed and well maintained efforts such as Alice. If they are young, its the optimum time for language acquisition. So, it may be easier (and have more side benefits) to teach them English and then programming rather than creating a customized programming environment catering to their native language to use to teach them programming.
- ianb 14y agoLogo is one of the few programming languages that has been translated into other languages, you might look for a dialect in whatever your native language is.
- eru 14y agoJust having the documentation translated might be enough. I remember using MS QBasic very early on; the language itself had English keywords and function names, but the online help was translated into German.
- nandemo 14y agoWhile it's certainly possible to learn programming without knowing English (millions of programmers have done it!), if your cousins don't speak English or another foreign language then you should probably consider that a priority, instead of programming.
- why-el 14y agoThey do speak foreign languages, but not English.