Homework help requested (not what you think!)

[Joel Goldstick]

On Tue, Jul 16, 2013 at 8:40 PM, Chris Angelico <rosuav at gmail.com> wrote:

> On Wed, Jul 17, 2013 at 8:43 AM, John Ladasky
> <john_ladasky at sbcglobal.net> wrote:
> > I think that they're disappointed when I show them how much they have to
> understand just to write a program that plays Tic Tac Toe.
>
>
> The disillusionment of every novice programmer, I think. It starts out
> as "I want to learn programming and make a game". Real programming is
> more like "I can automate mundane tasks", which doesn't sound half as
> exciting. But this is why I'm dubious of programming courses that
> actually try to hold onto the "let's make a game" concept, because the
> students are likely to get a bit of a let-down on realizing that it
> really doesn't work that easily ("this is a two-week course, at the
> end of it I should have written the next <insert name of popular game>
> for all my friends").
>
> ChrisA
> --
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
>

There is a book : http://inventwithpython.com/  *Invent Your Own Computer
Games with Python*
which claims to teach people to program games in python.  I haven't read
it, but it seems to be for beginning programmers.  Take a look.. Maybe it
would work for your kids.  It says its for kids younger than high school,
but it claims to be for all ages.  It does cover the turf your gang seems
most interested in.  Other positives -- its free online.  so no
investment.  And it introduces the concept of open source which is really a
key to a large segment of the whole software world, so that gives another
teaching moment

-- 
Joel Goldstick
http://joelgoldstick.com
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