Coding for kids?

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mattyb

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#269885 13-Apr-2020 10:43

My 8 year old daughter is interested in learning some basic coding. Anyone got any recommendations of somewhere to start? I'm a mechanical engineer and have very little experience but I know my way around IT relatively.

Ideally it's free but happy to pay as well. Online of course, and maybe something I could do with her, rather than hand her a device and let her go for it, at least initially.

Big prerequisite is it must be FUN to get her engaged, and educational as well.

Many thanks in advance!!

Happy (lockdown) Easter.

Admin - please move to correct forum if need be.

sidefx

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#2460228 13-Apr-2020 10:54

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Have been thinking about trying to do the same with my kids. This stackoverflow thread looks interesting:

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/20059/suggestions-on-starting-a-child-programming

in particular the creator of KPL\Phrogram who suggests: "Scratch, Alice, Phrogram" in that order.

Also lots of suggestions for Lego mindstorm, I guess if your kids already like lego that would be a good window. Also appeals to me as I imagine it's a good combination of mechanical, electrical and coding type stuff?

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Inphinity

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#2460229 13-Apr-2020 11:01

Scratch

Mark

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#2460248 13-Apr-2020 11:10

I'm getting some Micro:bit devices for my boys, look to cover the basics of logic nicely while hiding the complex stuff till later.

https://microbit.org/

Also portable so they can take a creation to school with just a battery pack.

freitasm

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#2460395 13-Apr-2020 11:34

@mattyb:

Admin - please move to correct forum if need be.

While not directly related to the Remote Education that our kids will experience when school comes back, I thought moving to the new Remote Education sub-forum made sense.

myndlyz

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#2460396 13-Apr-2020 11:37

This one is pretty good: https://grasshopper.app/

afe66

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#2460406 13-Apr-2020 11:46

8 year old girl recommends code.org.

Scratch mainly.

mdf

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#2460429 13-Apr-2020 12:11

IME, picking a project is more important than picking a coding language/tool. And the project should match the child's interests.

Little Miss MDF (11) had no real in Scratch/coding until she realised that she could make her own game (a cross over featuring various of her favourite characters). From there she rapidly worked through Scratch and now is moving on to Python, with Phaser her next objective. I managed to get a great Humble Bundle deal on some interactive tutorials, though that deal seems to have expired.

Littler Miss MDF (9) was a bit more interested in coding in and of itself, but things really took off when she was able to combine making stuff/physical engineering (which she has always loved) with computer control. So for her, mBlock is much more interesting than Scratch because of what it does, rather than how you do it (which is identical).

I can imagine particular children being interested in building a website, building a smartphone app, making quizzes (mine love that), making games, making custom levels for favourite games, or any number of other things. While some will probably learn to code from inherent interest (GZ might be over-represented in that category), certainly my kids treat coding as a tool to achieve that outcome rather than an end goal in itself

I'd suggest you hunt around for a tutorial, how-to or book for a project likely to capture their interest and work from there. The ideas, skills and how to troubleshoot and solve problems are probably more useful than any specific language.

And just because it is a good place to put it, Lightbot is an awesome wee game (app and website version available) that is very much a trojan horse into teaching kids coding skills without them knowing.

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D.W

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#2460438 13-Apr-2020 12:20

Code Club is great and they've just moved online: https://codeclub.nz/

NightStalker

314 posts

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#2460481 13-Apr-2020 12:52

have a look at Rabbids Coding from Ubisoft (Free Here)

Not exactly "real coding" but a good place to start understanding the basics of pseudocode before looking at specific programming languages.

networkn

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#2460547 13-Apr-2020 14:24

My Son uses scratch and some others, but for his age group (he is turning 11 soon) it's very good. He has done some great stuff with it. There are so many resources for it as well.

chevrolux

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#2460557 13-Apr-2020 14:48

Yea personally (from my experience being a kid once), I would say it's got to be teamed up with something tangible. So like an arduino or raspberry pi dev kit would be a good option, as then you start linking up lights, motors, sensors etc.

Raspberry Pi probably a really good option with Raspbian coming with Scratch out of the box.

Shindig

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#2460875 14-Apr-2020 08:29

I'm going through the channel9 - Python for Beginners - https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLlrxD0HtieHhS8VzuMCfQD4uJ9yne1mE6

Fluent in PowerShell, but wanted to get some exposure in Python.

Going through the videos and real-world experience of writing code in VS Code with my 9 and 6yr old kids

They think its quite cool.

The little things make the biggest difference.

mattyb

254 posts

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#2463477 16-Apr-2020 14:42

Thanks for the all the suggestions!!

Have been very busy with work but will have a read through.

MikeAqua

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#2463593 16-Apr-2020 16:28

Any recommendations for a 45 year old kid?

(asking for a friend)

Mike

networkn

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#2463608 16-Apr-2020 16:52

MikeAqua:

Any recommendations for a 45 year old kid?

(asking for a friend)

With what end intention? If it's just to play with, then same recommendations apply to learn, but if you want to make a career of it, you'd need some idea on what type of dev your friend would want to get into to help select a language to learn and resources to point him or her to?