P.S. I agree. With dvice_null, dont teach multiple languages at once, I tried that when I was 16... uhh yeah...Just dont =p.
P.P.S. You should be happy, this is the post that finally made me join Slashdot =p
Alright, well you asked for the input of a high schooler... Okay so I'm a Senior in high school. I started programming with BASIC and HTML.. Python might be a good start but depending upon the age might be a little complex.. I'm also wondering why your steering him towards *NIX. Thats a mistake right there, I've been forced to use a single OS since I was little, playing games on the lap of my grandfather (an original IBM geek), back on DOS, then on Windows until recently when I bought my own iMac. *NIX is great but forcing him in one direction will limit him. A true programmer should be able to compile code an any OS hes thrown at. Which means if the code is a different dialect, he should be able to convert it, now I know that no one can ever hope to know all the dialects and all the programming languages, for there are far too many. But don't just sit him in front of lenny and have him code exclusivly on one OS. What I think you should do is just see if he shows enough interest in programming to actually sit down and learn the stuff. If you throw it at him, he might loose interest, or it could flourish, who knows. If you really want to peak his interest, just *tell* him about AJAX and go to Facebook or another popular site that heavily utilizes it, show him what AJAX does compared to HTML alone, or simple PHP. That would have caught my interest a long time ago, should it have existed. Leave a editor or IDE window open and blank, and a programming book next to it (go out and buy one even). Tell him your leaving to go do errands (and actually do it) if hes interested you might come home to a new program being created, or a second Hello World, the point is if he decided to do it when he was alone, he'll be interested enough to pursue it as a hobby. Thats my two cents.
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P.S. I agree. With dvice_null, dont teach multiple languages at once, I tried that when I was 16... uhh yeah...Just dont =p. P.P.S. You should be happy, this is the post that finally made me join Slashdot =p
Alright, well you asked for the input of a high schooler... Okay so I'm a Senior in high school. I started programming with BASIC and HTML.. Python might be a good start but depending upon the age might be a little complex.. I'm also wondering why your steering him towards *NIX. Thats a mistake right there, I've been forced to use a single OS since I was little, playing games on the lap of my grandfather (an original IBM geek), back on DOS, then on Windows until recently when I bought my own iMac. *NIX is great but forcing him in one direction will limit him. A true programmer should be able to compile code an any OS hes thrown at. Which means if the code is a different dialect, he should be able to convert it, now I know that no one can ever hope to know all the dialects and all the programming languages, for there are far too many. But don't just sit him in front of lenny and have him code exclusivly on one OS. What I think you should do is just see if he shows enough interest in programming to actually sit down and learn the stuff. If you throw it at him, he might loose interest, or it could flourish, who knows. If you really want to peak his interest, just *tell* him about AJAX and go to Facebook or another popular site that heavily utilizes it, show him what AJAX does compared to HTML alone, or simple PHP. That would have caught my interest a long time ago, should it have existed. Leave a editor or IDE window open and blank, and a programming book next to it (go out and buy one even). Tell him your leaving to go do errands (and actually do it) if hes interested you might come home to a new program being created, or a second Hello World, the point is if he decided to do it when he was alone, he'll be interested enough to pursue it as a hobby. Thats my two cents.