Learning to Program - Where to Start?

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floydbloke

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#95872 15-Jan-2012 12:18

I'm a self taught hobbyist/tinkerer programmer and my first introduction to programming was ZX81 BASIC. I've gone on to become somewhat competent in C++ and can pretty quickly get my head around most other scripting environments.

My son, who is about to turn 13, has shown an interest in IT and learning to program, and even if he doesn't pursue a career in development I believe there is some merit in learning some programming skills.

Given that it has served me quite well, my thoughts are to start him off learning ZX81 BASIC also. My rationale for this:
*I've got the environment, a solid emulator that works well (without rampack wobbles

)
*It's simple
*It's nearly syntax foolproof
*The manual, available online, is a good course in BASIC

I'm conscious of the constraints but I figure it introduces the concepts of variables, string, loops, subroutines, etc.

Before we venture down this track though, I thought I'd come here first and ask for alternate (better?) ways/opinions to introduce someone to the world of programming.

Did Eric Clapton really think she looked wonderful...or was it after the 15th outfit she tried on and he just wanted to get to the party and get a drink?

Zeon

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#569071 15-Jan-2012 13:33

As you mentioned, avoid languages where you always get syntax errors that are difficult to figure out (*cough* javascript *cough*). If he's just starting are there not "learning" languages which have a really easy to use IDE?

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porche20002

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#569100 15-Jan-2012 14:19

I took Computing Studies last year and my teacher started us all off on Visual Basic. He said that the syntax was relatively easy to learn because every command was made using plain english (American English - so like textbox1.background = [b]color[b].white). The complier is pretty sturdy and if there are syntax errors they make sense and highlight the part of the code that doesn't work.

Although Visual Basic is not command line based, you can program it without a GUI and used CMD instead. Visual Basic is very simple and there's plenty of help available online. I could even email some of the notes I made for it, including useful syntax and computing theory.

gzt

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#569111 15-Jan-2012 14:41

The nice thing about your approach is that working game code is short and plentiful, and he will get good visual feedback from changing things of interest and seeing the effect.

Back in the day typing code into my VIC20 from the games manual taught me good things about syntax and accuracy and severely tested my patience in finding typing errors which is probably what you remember as well.

Ye olde basic on vintage machines has a really nice close to the hardware low level feeling about it which translates well to even lower levels like assembly if he gets interested, and the concepts learned also translate well to things like C pointers, and then the higher level C++ abstractions.

bmoff

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#569124 15-Jan-2012 15:15

Would this be useful?

http://codeyear.com/

nate

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#569134 15-Jan-2012 15:50

Jump in head first, and be prepared to spend hours and hours on stupid little issues.

The good thing is once you learn from them, it makes bugs easier to get rid of in the future.

floydbloke

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#569139 15-Jan-2012 16:05

Good tips here, thank you all.

Did Eric Clapton really think she looked wonderful...or was it after the 15th outfit she tried on and he just wanted to get to the party and get a drink?

k1w33d

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#569249 15-Jan-2012 21:57

You could also try Kojo which was designed to introduce children to the concept of programming in an easy to use IDE. It is open source and also only a small download and contains some easy to understand and interactive tutorials. Here is an excerpt from their website.

Kojo is a desktop application that runs on Windows, Linux, and the Mac. It is a Learning Environment - with many different features that enable play, exploration, and learning in the areas of:

Computer Programming
Math and Science
Systematic and Computational Thinking
Art, Music, and Creative Thinking
Computer and Internet Literacy

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jonnyr

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#572374 23-Jan-2012 14:36

I'd recommend stanfords open engineering.

http://see.stanford.edu/

class cs106a is the best free intro to programming, focussing on methodology rather than syntax. It's a full course with materials and videos, basically the foundation course at stanford university made public.
http://see.stanford.edu/see/courseinfo.aspx?coll=824a47e1-135f-4508-a5aa-866adcae1111

The concepts are introduced and explained using an absracted Karol langauge (basically java).

Good luck

Jon

reven

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#572396 23-Jan-2012 15:25

when i was young i did some basic, i got excited when i manage to move something across the screen and i learnt i could use a loop and make a border in 3 lines of code instead of 30 or so.

that being said, it was too difficult for me to make a program that did anything, and i lost interest.

i would suggest another route, perhaps a game engine IDE, which is mostly GUI based, but has some programming parts for more complex things. when i was about 11 i got "the game workshop" (i think thats what it was called). basically it was a 2d game IDE, where i could drag characters on screen, design levels, easily hookup actions (move, shoot etc), but if i wanted to do something tricker, like go down a pipe to a basement level i would have to do some programming. i made about 15 games using this. and now im a professional programmer :)

u need to get something where he feels he is achieving something and doing something useful and having fun. not sure if basic or old school programming language would achieve that.

you could go down the C# path, great ide, language has good syntax, easy to make windows applications. but would he have fun making a notepad app or excel app?

EDIT: this may have been it http://www.yoyogames.com/ its been about 15 years, cant remember what it was called exactly...

jonb

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#572419 23-Jan-2012 16:17

You would get a nice introduction to programming concepts using one of the 'make a game' type programs. They have the concept of objects and attributes and all that, and you get an instant reward when you get it right. I used one of these last year, yoyo games maker I think, when my 9yr old wanted to make a game: http://www.geekzone.co.nz/forums.asp?forumid=72&topicid=58559

billgates

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#572420 23-Jan-2012 16:24

C#

http://www.amazon.com/Head-First-2E-Real-World-Programming/dp/1449380344/ref=sr_1_7?ie=UTF8&qid=1327289075&sr=8-7

Do whatever you want to do man.

Hammerer

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#572482 23-Jan-2012 18:25

I just read this article on Best Free Ways to Learn Programming which seems to be aimed at kids.

Last Summer holidays, I "forced" my 12 and 13 year old boys to learn Python rather than spending the whole summer on the Xbox and PC. I used an open source manual from a first year course at Otago University. They coped but the lack of interesting visual feedback was a real problem. The good thing was that this year when I told them they had do something useful, one started a fitness program and the other is memorizing useful texts.

floydbloke

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#573277 25-Jan-2012 20:20

Thanks. Some great posts here about making it fun and interesting. Just because I thought that (back then) being able to move an ASCII character across the bottom of the screen with the arrow keys was pretty cool doesn't mean he will. Being dyslexic / dyspraxic doesn't help his attention span.

I'll check out some of the 'game' programming tutorials that have been suggested

Did Eric Clapton really think she looked wonderful...or was it after the 15th outfit she tried on and he just wanted to get to the party and get a drink?

kyhwana2

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#573287 25-Jan-2012 20:38

Once he's gotten basic/VB, have him learn python..