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I teach high school computer science near Stanford. Depends on the age of the learners. For kids in school, programs like Alice or Scratch are a fun way to star
by mpstreeter 13y ago
I teach high school computer science near Stanford. Depends on the age of the learners. For kids in school, programs like Alice or Scratch are a fun way to start because they're more visual. Lego Mindstorms are a fun step up b/c you also get to build something that moves based on your code. After that Python is great. Then HTML/CSS/JS/Ruby on Rails so they can build their own web portfolio or web app. MIT has a program called App Inventor (http://appinventor.mit.edu/ http://appinventor.mit.edu/) that is similar to Scratch and lets you make Android apps using drag and drop code pieces.
- faizshah 13y agoI agree with you on the other languages, but I have to disagree on Scratch(I have not tried Alice). I found it was more difficult to teach basic programming concepts in Scratch than it was to teach those concepts in Processing, which also provides a very visual programming experience, as well as the instant satisfaction of seeing a solution. I also found that once those that I was teaching were proficient in Processing it was easier to transition to other languages like python, ruby, and java. I also think that Processing gets learners interested in programming much more than other languages because they see how easy it is to make their ideas come to life. Granted it's the same idea as Scratch, but the transition from Processing to "more difficult" languages is much easier than from say Scratch to Python. Thanks for the App Inventor recommendation, I'll have a look.