I made Pickcode, where kids can make chatbots and graphic designs using a hybrid visual/text programming language. https://app.pickcode.io/courses has 5 lessons (todo: make many more), I would say the ones listed as beginner could be fun to pair on with a 7 year old!
Ask HN: Technology/creative books and games for my daughter (7 years)
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Re: Ask HN: Technology/creative books and games for my daughter (7 years)
#32The Hello Ruby books are _amazing_. They won actual design awards: http://www.helloruby.com The girl in the books is just named Ruby, the books really don't have a connection to Ruby the Programming Language.
This is great!
Re: Ask HN: Technology/creative books and games for my daughter (7 years)
#33Thanks for the comments everyone, got to know so many new stuff to explore.
Re: Ask HN: Technology/creative books and games for my daughter (7 years)
#34There's an old game from the 90s I loved : The Incredible Machine . It's all about devising elaborate Rube Goldberg machines to solve puzzles. The cat knocks a ball into the goldfish bowl, which tips over and fills a bucket that operates a pulley that flips a switch that opens a door. That kind of thing. I remember it being very freeform and exploratory, teaching cause and effect and physics and thinking through comp…
The Incredible Machine is available on GOG:
https://www.gog.com/en/game/the_incredible_machine_mega_pack
Re: Ask HN: Technology/creative books and games for my daughter (7 years)
#35Minecraft. My kids, a bit younger than 7, are ridiculously creative with it. They’re always making redstone music machines and piston machines.
The best thing about Minecraft is that it naturally scales to their skill. They began just learning the controls and exploring. Then made simple houses. Etc…
The older one is so hooked he builds his own mechanical pressure plates and pistons with Lego.
Re: Ask HN: Technology/creative books and games for my daughter (7 years)
#36Not sure if 7 is old enough, I made this card "game" with my daughter when she was 10: https://punkx.org/4917/ which is not really a game but more like a puzzle, you have 54 small programs for a 4 bit made up computer (Richard Buckland's computer) and you have to interpret them in your head or with pen and paper. It's quite interesting to play with her when I change few instructions on a card. (you can also print it yourself on a4 paper)
Other interesting game are of course robot turtles (http://www.robotturtles.com/), but she might be too old for it.
And you might like Mark Rober's https://www.crunchlabs.com/
There is human resource machine that my daughter played when she was 8 or so (https://tomorrowcorporation.com/humanresourcemachine) which is a brilliant game.
Also all kinds of "crypto" books, from caesar's cipher to morse code books were very interesting
Re: Ask HN: Technology/creative books and games for my daughter (7 years)
#37As far as creative books go, I want to share "A theory of fun" (https://www.amazon.com/Theory-Game-Design-Raph-Koster/dp/144...) - it's a game design book very accessible for an .. let's say 8-10 year old, might still be a bit early for your daughter depending on her level.
Re: Ask HN: Technology/creative books and games for my daughter (7 years)
#38I'm building mobile games where you can use AI and machine learning to solve different puzzles.
It has some fans among teenagers: https://ai-simulator.com/
Re: Ask HN: Technology/creative books and games for my daughter (7 years)
#39I can highly recommend Amazing Tales, it is a pen and paper RPG for kids her age. I play with my daughter and she LOVES it. You only need a couple of six sided dice, although you can optionally spice things up with 8, 10, and 12 sided die if you have them (or you can make it special and buy some from your local games shop). It's basically collaborative storytelling, and the possibility of failing dice rolls makes it…
Hero Kids is another well regarded kid friendly rpg. Also only relies on 6 sided die and each session is an hour tops. Has been a fun way to spend a rainy day for our kids and they get pretty creative, so much so that the "story" sometimes continues throughout the day as they talk about their heros.
Also cheap, especially if you purchase the bundle. https://www.heroforgegames.com/hero-kids/
Re: Ask HN: Technology/creative books and games for my daughter (7 years)
#40Meccano sets.
For MEV! I love them even 30 years after I got my set, was one of the best "toys" I got as a child.
All old Lego mindstorm are amazing also.
Primo is a toy for even younger people that is cute and teach them about sequences of actions and how to set that.