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Ask HN: How can I make a “kid's computer” today as good as an Apple II?

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Re: Ask HN: How can I make a “kid's computer” today as good as an Apple II?

#221

Post by sebastianconcpt »

hnthrowaway0315 wrote: post #140
sebastianconcpt wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good observation. This generation has the problem of abundance of resources and attention competition which we didn't have in the Apple II years. Worst, you have TikTok kind of content contaminating them with futility that makes them get dopamine shots in exchange of "short exciting things" that will make them A) loose time and B) raise expectations on what will make them trigger dopamine hits in the future.

And once the dopamine shots are done, there is no way back unless the parents are very mindful. It would be only decades later, when they are at our age (30/40) that they realized that something could be changed back then. In reality I see many parents actively feed kids with dopamine shots because it "quiets the kids". TBH I don't know what I can do. Even as both my wife and I are aware of the situation, in daycares…

Somehow, the attempt has to be in imprinting virtue and high values. And a lot of the culture wants people to focus in resentment, self-victimism and ungratefulness towards anything good and punishing what's trying to be good. Negative Dialectics focused in this, the destruction of everything.

Re: Ask HN: How can I make a “kid's computer” today as good as an Apple II?

#222

Post by singhrac »

openknot wrote: post #114
snowwrestler wrote: post #112

Take any decent computer and point the browser at scratch.mit.edu. It’s got fun, easy ways for kids to learn programming concepts. And more importantly (to the kids), it’s got tons of fun content that other kids have made using those tools. This helps spread ideas and inspiration. They can see something cool and then “look inside it” to see how it was built. Kids want to be doing what other kids today are doing. Hear…

To add to the value of Scratch: it's taught at the start of Harvard's CS50 course for introductory programming. It's a drag-and-drop block-based code editor, which is good for learning about if statements and loops while getting an immediate result. (e.g. the instructions cause an animated character moves in a certain way). The immediate reward can help motivate programming, as it skips the time needed to memorize fu…

I will chime in that I program professionally and first learned in the 7th grade in Scratch.

The most incredible moment for me was that for CS50 I found a game I had uploaded to scratch.mit.edu maybe 6 years earlier and submitted it (it was my own work, after all). Great platform, I remember fondly learning how to program a platformer on there without a camera system.

Re: Ask HN: How can I make a “kid's computer” today as good as an Apple II?

#223

Post by markus_zhang »

ivansavz wrote: post #125
foobarian wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is super depressing. What do we do? Firewall all the things at the house and get rid of tablets/phones?

One thing to realize is that technology is not bad—it's the shitty apps and the social media superficialities that are bad. So if you can pre-load the "good stuff" (educational stuff, documentaries, wikipedia, etc.) then you're biasing their device time toward useful stuff. Here is a comment with detailed instructions for how to setup Kolibri and Kiwix, which are really useful educational software that works on local…

Thanks this is really good.

Re: Ask HN: How can I make a “kid's computer” today as good as an Apple II?

#224

Post by blooalien »

m-i-l wrote: post #53

My daughter just built her very own Raspberry Pi 4 based computer[0] last weekend for her 10th birthday. Key points: - She picked the components herself (with dad's supervision to make sure they would work together), so the case and keyboard and so on are ones she likes the look of and wants on her desk. - She assembled it all and installed the OS herself (again with dad supervising but trying really hard not to help…

Raspberry Pi for the win! I love my RPis, and feel like the release and continued support and improvement of them and similar devices has caused a bit of a resurgence of the old "Hacker" mentality. Buy a kid a box of Raspberry Pi's and related components and show 'em the right websites, and stand back. Lord only knows what kinda crazy/fun stuff they'll build. ;)

Re: Ask HN: How can I make a “kid's computer” today as good as an Apple II?

#225

Post by rcarmo »

Even though both my kids are in their early teens and graduated to using regular computers, I am building a dedicated PICO-8 machine: https://taoofmac.com/space/blog/2022/01/29/1830

They went through Scratch in a browser and iPads to Unity and Xcode (through Thonny on a Pi and Pythonista on iOS), but we all like PICO-8’s constraints and integrated graphics/music/code editing. It is a gem and feels better than the ZX Spectrum and C64 ever did, really.

So maybe just get a Pi or and old laptop and buy PICO-8 to run on it as an experiment.

Re: Ask HN: How can I make a “kid's computer” today as good as an Apple II?

#226

Post by asddubs »

bmj wrote: post #156
asddubs wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

minecraft modding is doable with some help. obviously more complex than writing some little BASIC program from scratch since you're hooking into existing things that are at times not ideally documented but it's a lot more feasible than trying to teach your kid unity, probably

There are plenty of tutorials available out there, with some geared toward kids with no programming experience. My older son went through a class (can't remember which one...it was at least six years ago) that did a very nice job of making basic Minecraft mods very accessible, while still introducing programming topics.

plus it's java, so it's something they can actually carry on to use in the future, rather than some proprietary custom script language with wildly different syntax than anything else. it's even got strict typing!

Re: Ask HN: How can I make a “kid's computer” today as good as an Apple II?

#228

Post by novaleaf »

snowwrestler wrote: post #112

Take any decent computer and point the browser at scratch.mit.edu. It’s got fun, easy ways for kids to learn programming concepts. And more importantly (to the kids), it’s got tons of fun content that other kids have made using those tools. This helps spread ideas and inspiration. They can see something cool and then “look inside it” to see how it was built. Kids want to be doing what other kids today are doing. Hear…

For older kids, the Microsoft MakeCode platform is great.

They have a microbit IDE, including emulator: https://makecode.microbit.org/

And a dedicated gaming device like a gameboy, including emulator: https://arcade.makecode.com/

Can code in Blocks, Javascript, or Python.

Re: Ask HN: How can I make a “kid's computer” today as good as an Apple II?

#229

Post by cout »

billziss wrote: post #8

I had a similar problem a few years ago. While I never found the perfect machine here is how I have been introducing my now 10 year old son to the world of computers: - I bought him a Kano computer kit when he was about 7. The kit retailed for about $250 at the time and a kid could assemble it "like LEGO". It came with educational software that introduced him to programming languages, etc. (Unfortunately I do not thi…

Do you think any of these would work for a 3-year-old?

Re: Ask HN: How can I make a “kid's computer” today as good as an Apple II?

#230

Post by ddingus »

markus_zhang wrote: post #208
ddingus wrote: post #179

Well, you could just get an Apple. New plus boards are being made, the cards you need are available. Mine is equipped with: 80 Col / mem expansion to 128K Fast Chip for some speed, up to 16Mhz (which is crazy fast on most software designed for 1Mhz) HDMI output device, VidHD card. This thing is GREAT. CFFA / USB Flash disk solution for loading programs, disk images, etc... My younger granddaughter enjoys the machine.…

Thanks a lot. Do you have a link to get all of the components? Would be nice if I don't need to solder anything. BTW found reactivemicro. $340 for a fully assembled board looks fine to me. Not sure where to find other components you mentioned but I'll keep looking.

I just saw this. Will link over the weekend.
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