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How To Encourage a Young Teen To Learn Programming?

Anonymous Hacker writes "I'm in a bit of a bind. My young teenage son is starting to get curious about computers, and in particular, programming. Now, I'm a long time kernel hacker (Linux, BSD and UNIX). I have no trouble handling some of the more obscure things in the kernel. But teaching is not something that I'm good at, by any means. Heck, I can't even write useful documentation for non-techies. So my question is: what's the best way to encourage his curiosity and enable him to learn? Now, I know there are folks out there with far better experience in this area than myself. I'd really appreciate any wisdom you can offer. I'd also be especially interested in what younger people think, in particular those who are currently in college or high school. I've shown my son some of the basics of the shell, the filesystem, and even how to do a 'Hello World' program in C. Yet, I have to wonder if this is the really the right approach. This was great when I was first learning things. And it still is for kernel hacking, and other things. But I'm concerned whether this will bore him, now that there's so much more available and much of this world is oriented towards point-n-click. What's the best way to for a young teen to get started in exploring this wonderful world of computers and learning how to program? In a *NIX environment, preferably." Whether or not you have suggestions for generating interest or teaching methods, there was probably something that first piqued your curiosity. It seems like a lot of people get into programming by just wondering how something works or what they can make it do. So, what caught your eye?

5 of 1,095 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Son? by __aamdex1616 · · Score: 5, Funny

    I thought geeks didn't have sex ...

    Geeks clone themselves, it provides the same benefits without all the hassle with bodily fluids.

  2. Re:python by Malekin · · Score: 5, Funny

    Forbid him to learn python. Then he'll do it himself to spite you.

  3. Re:Son? by pclinger · · Score: 5, Funny

    Geeks clone themselves, it provides the same benefits without all the hassle with women.

    It seems you made a mistake in your post, I've gone ahead and fixed it though.

    --
    /. editors made it impossible to link to file:///c:/con/con in my sig. Please just type it in
  4. Re:Son? by K.+S.+Kyosuke · · Score: 5, Funny

    More than half of the a woman's body is water. So without loss of generality, he could just have written "without all the hassle with opinionated bodily fluids".

    --
    Ezekiel 23:20
  5. Re:PHP will ruin your mind by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Hey, I learned PHP as a first language you insensiti-Warning: Cannot modify header information - headers already sent by (output started at /home/a9286564/public_html/x/forum/bb-settings.php:169) in /home/a9286564/public_html/x/forum/bb-admin/install.php on line 10