How To Teach a 12-Year-Old To Program?

thelordx writes "I've got a much younger brother who I'd like to teach how to program. When I was younger, you'd often start off with something like BASIC or Apple BASIC, maybe move on to Pascal, and eventually get to C and Java. Is something like Pascal still a dominant teaching language? I'd love to get low-level with him, and I firmly believe that C is the best language to eventually learn, but I'm not sure how to get him there. Can anyone recommend a language I can start to teach him that is simple enough to learn quickly, but powerful enough to do interesting things and lead him down a path towards C/C++?"

Comments

Python

[stoolpigeon]

Python is multiplatform and is free. There are quite a few free tools and libraries available. It is a 'real' language that is at the same time suitable for youngsters to learn on. With the huge Python ecosystem that exists you can have them cranking out code in a text editor, an interpreter or a full blown IDE. (A wide number of them in fact). Python also makes for a nice bridge to C as it pretty easy to integrate the two. If you feel competent, you could probably just hit the Python docs and work your way through them. If you'd like a little help and have material already prepared for teaching younger people how to program with Python, there are resources out there.
 
I recommend Hello World! which uses Python. (You can read my full review of it here.)
 
If you don't want to buy a book, then you may want to look at Invent Your Own Computer Games with Python 2nd ed. I haven't read it myself yet, and a quick glance showed it to have some rough edges, but one can't be too picky at that price. It is available to download or read online.