Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Recommended Resources 1st programming languages

I think I noticed one or two threads a while back touching on this subject but it is a hassle trying to locate them and I am not sure if they are directly applicable. My own computer knowledge/programming experience is so ancient that I would not want to rely on it.

Anyhow, which programming languages are ideal as a 1st language and why? Does the age of the learner matter? What resources are effective for self-teaching purposes (as opposed to an actual course)?

Not sure exactly what you are looking for but our girls have played some with Scratch. They found it fun, but weren't excessively interested (meaning they didn't constantly ask for computer time to play around with it).

http://scratch.mit.edu/

A recent thread on this topic "Codecademy (learning to program in Javascript)" is at

http://giftedissues.davidsongifted.org/BB/ubbthreads.php/topics/138843/1.html .

FWIW my ds liked Scratch when he was young (he was intro'd to it at school). He's studying Python on his own (self-paced, has a "how-to" book that we got through a reference on these boards). He tried one of the online Java courses - I can't remember who it was through - but it required a lot of debugging from me and dh.... and he ended up dropping it because it wasn't all that appealing to him.

polarbear

I'd say Scratch for any age as a first language because by its nature it encourages play and exploration to learn the language. It also minimizes the impact of syntax learning on the development of programmatic thinking and design skills.

Our kids did Scratch first, and then Gamemaker (the latter in a NUMATS GLL online course). Ds then studied making IOS apps. Now he's studying Java through GLL because he wants to create a Minecraft mod to establish his programming cred in the Minecraft world. The next step of the plan is for Mojang to hire him so he can spend the rest of his life in Stockholm programming Minecraft. He's 13yo.

DS9 played a little with Gamemaker when he was 7- but he didn't really understand what he was doing. Sort of like doing math with no numerical understanding- just following the prescribed set of rules. He's doing Python now, self-taught with a book (Python for kids). He seems to be getting a better understanding of what he's doing instead of blindly following steps.

Edited to add: We also love the MIT course and DH has been watching it to head off any questions from DS.

I think that I will at least let DS/DD take a look at that when I get around to encourage programming language acquisition.

Thanks for the link. There are a lot of useful information in that thread. I am marking it for future reference.

The last programming I did was in Fortran.