[Edu-sig] Re: easy for beginners, even children
Daniel Ajoy
dajoy at openworldlearning.org
Mon Apr 12 09:56:46 EDT 2004
On 12 Apr 2004 at 9:06, David Handy wrote:
> Yeah, Logo was designed for teaching. I'm still not motivated to use it
> for teaching my beginners.
>
> I think this syntax
>
> make "myarray {one two three}
>
> is more confusing for beginners than
>
> myarray = ['one', 'two', 'three']
It could be, but won't they get confused when
they learn about "==" vs "=". In Logo the
difference is more explicit:
how do you have to write this in Python:
make "a 10
if :a = 10 [make "a 20]
Besides:
In Logo:
? show 2 = 3
false
In Python:
>>> 2 = 3
SyntaxError: can't assign to literal
> I wish someone would do a controlled study of Logo and Python as first
> programming languages. It would be interesting to see which approach was
> more successful in helping people get started actually programming, as
> opposed to having a one-time experience and never touching it again.
I haven't learned Python yet because it seems something too big to learn
now. I'm more comfortable with small languages: bash, awk, logo
> Logo has been around longer than Python and it's the most well-known
> programming language. It's had plenty of time to prove itself. But I've
> not yet met anyone who said "yeah, Logo was great, after learning it I
> went on to..." write a game, do a project on their own, or anything.
Here are some:
http://developers.slashdot.org/developers/02/09/19/0548211.shtml?tid=146
cheers,
Daniel
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