[Edu-sig] Editors/IDEs for teaching

[A Jorge Garcia]

I like Processing and c9.io for my Computer Science kids. We also used arduino studio with codrones. 

My math students and I use python a lot on sagecell.sagemath.org.

HTH,
AJG

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On Jul 4, 2018, 12:16 PM, at 12:16 PM, Andre Roberge <andre.roberge at gmail.com> wrote:
>On Wed, Jul 4, 2018 at 12:09 PM Wanjun Zhang <by.wanjun at gmail.com>
>wrote:
>
>> Hi,
>>
>> We recently had to pick a beginner-friendly python editor for our
>Invent
>> to Learn summer program. We also teach a lot of Raspberry Pi based
>Intro to
>> Python workshops for kids and adults alike. In addition to
>editor/IDE,
>> there’s another category to consider - specialized education platform
>- For
>> instance, EarSketch <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EarSketch> is a
>> programming environment made specifically to teach coding through
>sound
>> mixing.
>>
>> Over the years we tried Trinket.io, PyCharm Edu, Visual Studio Code,
>Mu,
>> iPythonNotebooks, Earsketch, Processing in Python mode, Thonny, IDLE
>+ some
>> I don’t remember.
>>
>> For us, it’s about prioritizing specific goals for our students and
>our
>> program. For the summer program we are working with FabLab Houston to
>equip
>> students with both maker skills and programming skills. They will
>learn
>> Python with the Raspberry Pi with first the Minecraft Pi api, then
>sensor
>> stuffs with Circuit Python on Adafruit’s Circuit Playground Learning
>> Express, then Processing in Python mode to visualize some data with
>> neopixels. For Fab Lab our goal is also to 1. train FabLab staff
>members
>> with enough programming skills so they can deliver the Invent to
>Learn
>> program without us, 2. produce open source curriculum from this
>program for
>> other makerspaces.
>>
>> Ultimately, I think it should be up to the specific teacher to pick
>out
>> features - as programmers we tend to look at specs and numbers, but
>we must
>> also prioritize setting up educators for success - they are the
>frontline
>> workers delivering the service. For instance, trinket.io is our go-to
>> because a lot of educator’s don’t have admin access to their
>computers, so
>> web-based editor that is easy to use and specifically made for
>education is
>> great. However we do recognize the value in exposing our students to
>tools
>> that developers use - like PyCharm.
>> This is our pro and cons list off of the top of my head for choosing
>an
>> editor for different partners and educators that we work with:
>>
>> - *Platform* - can we do things in command line on the computer that
>is
>> available to us, whether that’s a raspberry pi, mac, or pc?
>Trinket.io is
>> a great web-based solution if that’s an issue.
>>
>> - Existing *resources and community* - are there educator resources?
>Is
>> this random IDE made by one person as a marketing exercise? if open
>source,
>> when is the projects' last pull request? The Thonny Editor is awesome
>> because there are a lot of high quality curriculum from
>> https://projects.raspberrypi.org/ Same goes for Trinket.io.
>>
>> - Learning Curve for *educator *- If a teacher is teaching this and
>not a
>> developer, are they able to successfully use this tool? Do we expect
>them
>> to learn to use the terminal? Again, Trinket.io is a great starting
>point.
>>
>> - Learning Curve for *student *- Does the IDE/Editor have too many
>> options? Not enough? What is the cognitive load for the student.
>>
>> *- Utility for student* - Do we want to provide a real world
>developer
>> experience for our students? Or is our goal to have them build
>something as
>> to inspire. Is this a long term program or a short term project? Do
>we want
>> learners to quickly go through turtles (trinket.io) or be exposed to
>> developer tools (pycharm)?
>>
>> After much consideration, we chose Thonny and also Python mode in the
>> Processing IDE for our three week program.
>>
>> Hope this helps.
>>
>
>
>​Yes, it does help very much.  I like your choice of Thonny +
>Processing.
>And your list of criterion is very good and may be useful to many
>people on
>this list.
>
>/Digression about trinket, and an alternative that I designed
>
>I know that a lot of people like trinket.io.  However, it has some
>negative
>points in my opinion:
>
>1. It uses an implementation of Python 2 - it is not compatible with
>Python
>3. To me, this is almost inexcusable.
>2. It is not a completely free, open source solution.
>
>As web based alternative to trinket, I suggest my own site:
>http://reeborg.ca/reeborg.html - which does support Python 3 and does
>not
>require users to log in. This has the downside that they cannot save
>their
>code on my site. However, it is possible to load code hosted elsewhere.
>For
>example, one could save some code on https://pastebin.com/ and load it
>from
>there.
>
>For graphics, Reeborg's World is based on using a Karel-like robot
>instead
>of a turtle mode ... BUT, one can (in principle) use turtle graphics on
>it
>-- I just haven't gotten around to incorporating the Brython turtle
>module
>into it.  (It's on my list of things to do. I can bump it up in
>priority
>enough people are interested, willing to test it and provide feedback).
>
>While anyone can run arbitrary programs on it, it is designed to have
>tasks
>that can give feedback to students as to whether or not a given task
>has
>been accomplished.
>
>It also offers the *choice* of using an REPL or a block programming
>interface.  Students can do live "pair programming" (with 2 or more
>people
>working on a same program from different computers) - or this can also
>be
>done by a teacher guiding a student at distance.  (For this feature, it
>uses Mozilla's TogetherJS - which is not compatible with the block
>interface designed by Google.) One can step through the code, examine
>the
>content of variables at every stage, etc.
>
>Because it is open source, anyone can get a copy of it and run it on
>their
>own site.  (Many teachers do this, as their students have limited
>access to
>the Internet.)  There's more that I could mention including an online
>python tutorial which I wrote and which is available in 3 languages
>(with a
>4th one in the works), an online texbook (written by someone else) that
>uses it, a printed book (published in France by another author) etc.,
>but
>this should be enough motivation for anyone interested to have a look
>at it.
>
>/End of digression
>
>
>
>André
>
>
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>
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