programming for children

[Dinu C. Gherman]

Fritz Heinrichmeyer wrote:
> 
> My son is 11 years and wants to learn programming. He heared about java at
> school (cool like nike or adidas ...) but in my opinion this is very hard
> stuff for a beginner to bring anything to play.

Most likely, you're absolutely right. Java was not designed
for 11 year old kids.

> I thought of a nice python environment under windows ... 
> It would be best to have german documentation too.

For the time being, the only entry-level Python documenta-
tion in German is Guido's Python Tutorial that I translated
some months ago into German. See "publications" on: 
  http://starship.python.net/crew/gherman/

For an 11-year old this might well be to abstract, though.

There is another nice entry-level (online) book that you might 
want to consider, although in English: Allen Downey's "Think-
ing" like a computer scientist" of which there should be a C++
and a Java version:

  http://www.cs.colby.edu/~downey/ost/thinkCS/

Jeffrey Elkner is preparing a Python version of it in HTML 
only. And I am in the process of evaluating if I can make an 
effort to join some forces with him to provide aversion of 
that in PS and PDF.

> What do you think?

I'm not sure there will be anything soon like a "Python for
Elementary School Pupils" tutorial or the like, but you never
know, what Guido's CP4E project will be able to produce on 
the long run... IPC8 showed that Python is very suitable for
initial non-programmers at least. So, watch this space for
further announcements!

Regards,

Dinu

-- 
Dinu C. Gherman
................................................................
Je me revolte, donc je suis. (Albert Camus)