Ask HN: Please share your experience teaching your kids to program

Wait what you guys actually save time by automating things?

They like fortnite!

My wife wishes my son wasn't so into gaming. I'm like, just push him to do gaming more, force him to game, then he will get into watercoloring.

I used Python and taught my 10yo son by working with him to design a text adventure game. While we were doing it together, he was engaged and enjoying it. His ability to understand and learn was never a challenge.

The challenge was that actually programming was apparently not his interest. He was more interested in story and puzzle design, and as he got older those interests expanded while programming just completely fell away.

Most people could program if they wanted, assuming they had an adequate teacher. But if they do not have the desire and drive, then it's not going to happen.

Edit - now I also recall that before the Python game effort, I got him started on Scratch, gave him a goal to make a simple Mario clone, and left him to it. A day later, he had made good progress but quickly lost interest and no longer wanted to work on it or talk about it.

I have a 7 year old and a 10 year old and have done lots and lots of volunteering teaching kids to code (via the Raspberry Pi Foundation's Code Club and CoderDojo schemes). My boys are very into building things with redstone in Minecraft and I've done quite a bit of programming with them.

What I would say is that 7 is still very young - the important thing at this age is that they are enjoying it, which it sounds like your son is and with you as a mentor, I don't think you can go too far wrong. If you weren't a programmer, I might be pointing you in various directions but don't think I need to.

I'm mostly thinking about resources that might be helpful. It's worth being aware that on the Raspberry Pi there is a Python API which might be a good way to introduce Python for a Minecraft fan. There are some articles about in old issues of Hello World magazine (PDFs available for free here: https://helloworld.raspberrypi.org/issues). You might find the magazine interesting generally. There's also a book Adventures in Minecraft by Martin O'Hanlan and David Whale. Typing ability is one of the big issues with python at that age though I find (that and the ability to make syntax errors which you don't get in Scratch!).

In terms of Scratch, there's the Code Club curriculum https://projects.raspberrypi.org/en/codeclub which isn't perfect, but is fairly well road-tested.

The BBC Microbit is also fun and not too expensive if you are looking for something a bit different and has a visual programming interface. I prefer that to lots of the robot kits etc. out there because it's so flexible and you can extend it into electronics if you want to. Having said that Lego Boost went done extremely well with our boys and is well thought through, but not cheap.

But the important thing at this age is that they enjoy it, so I think there's an art in terms of following what interests them and encouraging them with that.

Not a parent, but I was a child, and want to give my perspective from my memories learning my father's profession; writing.

We always had computers typewriters around the house, and I was fascinated by the look, smell, and sound of my father writing. And I just began doing it myself, probably with a small amount of guidance from him around the mechanics.

I ended up getting pretty good at prose by the time I was 9 or 10 and wrote a novella when I 14 (which was thankfully never published or distributed!). I don't write for a living but the skills stayed with me and of course have been very useful in all kinds of avenues.

I think, though, that if I had been encouraged to do 90 minute learning sessions with my father, I wouldn't have been so interested. There was a joy in finding my own path into that world, and if/when I do have children of my own this is something I will keep in mind that there's a fine line between sparking interest, and trying to force an interest.