Software engineers - have you taught your kids how to program yet?

[Nightynight]

...and if so, what language?

I am looking at 2 possible approaches. One is the Smalltalk / Kids Programming Language sort of environment. The problem is that this is heavily artificial. So many lines of code are already written behind anything the children do, that I feel they have little chance of really understanding what is happening in the program. Especially concepts like events, and objects.

What I would really like to do is get back to the BBC Micro days when you just switched the BBC on, and got a black screen with a cursor in the bottom lh corner, and you just started tpying your program, and got an immediate response. Ive looked at some BBC simulators, but the best Ive found yet is a German web site with Python for Kids.

Has anyone taught their children, and what was your experience?

god I wish you were my mum 20 years ago

I taught myself basic when I was aobut 12

everything kind of stopped for me after the ZX81 and the Oric Atmos

Enif, so did I! and thats what I want to do for my children.

ah, the good old days...

Good idea, NN. I'll ask dh at the weekend when he plans to start!
Mind you, he was showing our 6 yr old binary progression on Sunday...

I want to teach my kids Logo. But I don't know if it still exists.

It's artificial, yeah, but anything above Assembly has loads of code behind it.

At least Logo is recursive etc etc, so is a good intro to modern programming languages.

yes, it is true about loads of code, but Im really after something where they can clearly understand at least, how the code that they've written is executing.

wouldnt be surprised if there is loads of Logo stuff on the internet, Ill have a look later.

I got a copy of Logo from the internet a couple of years ago. I had fun, but DS (then aged 9) was not interested, even though they did a bit of logo at school. He is mad keen on computer games, likes to cerate his own scenarios, but shows no interest in progamming.

On the other hand, he wants to move to South Korea because of the advanced computing there. He was blown away by an episode of the Gadget Show that showed primary shcool children building and programming robots from scratch.

lol

I saw that episode - was also totally blown away and very impressed

and then took dd2 to her nursery at a pre-prep where the head doesnt 'believe' in computers

sigh

I did A'Level computer studies way back when they taught you BBC Basic

and you had to learn machine code too

The year I started in IT was the first year they did not teach graduates about punch cards....

Enif, that attitude is precisely what I want to challenge!
I don't 'believe' in computers either, if the children are just playing with some micky mouse software - but every child should learn programming!

For non software engineers, basic programming has more in common with crossword puzzles than maths. It teaches you to think logically, (and laterally sometimes) and organise your ideas.

clarkKent - have you checked out the KPL on the microsoft site? It is more to do with programming robots type of thing. they provide some windows based programs, that the children can alter.