Programming for my kids
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My eleven years old son's love programming game with RPG Game Maker. It's a programming language build in .NET. It's allow kids to program RPG game using pre-defined objects. Since he programs with Game Maker, my son knows how variables, events, loops, objects, bitmaps, sounds, etc works. I recommend it to everyone!
What is the URL for the RPG Game Maker? I don't find a product exactly matching that title in a search query. I see a couple RPG Maker products and a Game Maker, which my son also uses, but it's not exclusively for RPGs. And it's not based on .NET either.
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You're skipping a step. You start by finding out if they have any enthusiasm for it and if not, looking for ways to fire that curiosity and passion in them. Without an eager desire on their part, it's just drudgery no different than scraping an old coat of paint off the back fence. In such a case, there is no language or technology on the planet that will make a difference. Once they're interested, however, the rest comes easily.
Christopher Duncan www.PracticalUSA.com Author of The Career Programmer and Unite the Tribes Got a career question? Ask the Attack Chihuahua!
Couldn't agree more! Pretty much all the responses are of the form "I think this language is great, and {not very hard (Basic/Logo) | hard but important for learning basic computer science concepts (C/assembly/...)}". Kids need to discover and choose for themselves what they want to learn. When my parents got me a C64 as a child, I never really took to the (awful) Basic implementation that came on the machine - at best, a few sprite programs got typed in but nothing really 'clicked'. Then when I asked them to buy me an Atari ST years later, I stumbled upon the great, structured GFA Basic and loved it immediately. I'd say you should pick a selection of 5 or 6 candidates which differ wildly from each other but satisfy your needs in some way (e.g. Logo, Scheme, Basic, C#, ...) and have a chat with your kids, show them the 99-bottles-of-beer source for each. Let them pick.
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How do I start my two daughters on programming - their ages are 11 and 8. The elder one knows how to browse the Internet. Long back, when I started with Fortran IV, it was pretty easy. But now, where to start? I think it should be C (leaving pointers aside), but give your thoughts. - Amarnath
I downloaded Scratch and played with it. Wonderful!! A pity that we did'nt have such a thing when we were kids. A real tool to sparkle the creativity of kids. Thank you, MIT, for developing it and offering it for free. Thanks to all the contributors for this thread, for all the suggestions. - Amarnath
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How do I start my two daughters on programming - their ages are 11 and 8. The elder one knows how to browse the Internet. Long back, when I started with Fortran IV, it was pretty easy. But now, where to start? I think it should be C (leaving pointers aside), but give your thoughts. - Amarnath
I looked through the thread and did not see any reference to the Alice project. This is a free download and is designed to be a first introduction to object oriented programming. It has a nice GUI and you can relatively quickly get your kids writing their first app. check it out at http://www.alice.org.
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C seems pretty tough. something like BASIC or Logo would be much better. the first step, IMO, should be getting used to the idea of controlling the computer through simple instructions. then add IFs and FOR/WHILE loops, etc.. ideas like structured programming and function calls and data types can come later.
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What is the URL for the RPG Game Maker? I don't find a product exactly matching that title in a search query. I see a couple RPG Maker products and a Game Maker, which my son also uses, but it's not exclusively for RPGs. And it's not based on .NET either.
You are right. There are 2 products: "RPG Maker" and "Game Maker". My son too uses Game Maker . The best description is on the Web site:
Using easy to learn drag-and-drop actions, you can create professional looking games within very little time. You can make games with backgrounds, animated graphics, music and sound effects, and even 3D games! And when you've become more experienced, there is a built-in programming language, which gives you the full flexibility of creating games with Game Maker. What is best, is the fact that Game Maker can be used free of charge.
In fact, the programming language is Game Maker script (GMK) and it's a very good graphical learning language. -
How do I start my two daughters on programming - their ages are 11 and 8. The elder one knows how to browse the Internet. Long back, when I started with Fortran IV, it was pretty easy. But now, where to start? I think it should be C (leaving pointers aside), but give your thoughts. - Amarnath
Alice.org teaches OO Programming by letting you manipulate a 3D world. They are sponges and will absorb and intuitively grasp the concept of inheritance and object properties.
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Alice Alice is an innovative 3D programming environment that makes it easy to create an animation for telling a story, playing an interactive game, or a video to share on the web. Alice is a teaching tool for introductory computing. It uses 3D graphics and a drag-and-drop interface to facilitate a more engaging, less frustrating first programming experience.
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How do I start my two daughters on programming - their ages are 11 and 8. The elder one knows how to browse the Internet. Long back, when I started with Fortran IV, it was pretty easy. But now, where to start? I think it should be C (leaving pointers aside), but give your thoughts. - Amarnath
I started by scripting for several interesting games. There's a german game called Clonk, which has a C-like scripting language (www.clonk.de). The obvious advantage is, that it is more motivating, because of instantly visible effects of your work. But that probably only worked for me because I'm weird...
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How do I start my two daughters on programming - their ages are 11 and 8. The elder one knows how to browse the Internet. Long back, when I started with Fortran IV, it was pretty easy. But now, where to start? I think it should be C (leaving pointers aside), but give your thoughts. - Amarnath