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Ask HN: How to keep my daughter busy while tickling her curiosity

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Re: Ask HN: How to keep my daughter busy while tickling her curiosity

#211

Post by HideousKojima »

thendrill wrote: post #119
brailsafe wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been programming for 15 years and had to google what NAND was. Had a sense of XOR

You would be surprised how much more relevant info programmers miss... Example, most programmers I know have no idea when a variable gets allocated on the stack and when it's on the heap. Let's not talk about how many dont even know what a (stack overflow)[ https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stack_buffer_overflow ] is...

I'd venture 95% of JS and Python devs don't even know what the stack is. They might have some vague understanding of a reference type vs. a value type, but that's probably it. Even in something like C# or Java I'd guess it's less than half that know what they are.

Re: Ask HN: How to keep my daughter busy while tickling her curiosity

#212

Post by oblib »

HideousKojima wrote: post #169
nickysielicki wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have such a weird culture around how we treat teenagers in this country. We all remember drinking and smoking as teens, but parents tends to rule with an iron fist and convince themselves that they have more control than their parents did, which means we force healthy normal curious kids to go out to a secluded area (probably by car) to get high or drunk or explore in other ways, away from an adult that could help…

>We all remember drinking and smoking as teens Speak for yourself, worst thing I did in high school was play too many video games.

I have friends who spent a huge amount of money and time in "Arcades" playing pinball and then video games in the `70s-`80s. And others who spent even more on blow.

I never got into gaming or blow myself. I was much more intrigued with the tech of games than playing them, and it's been amazing to see it progress from Pong to what's out there now.

After all these years I wouldn't say hanging out with friends and drinking a few beers and puffing a few doobies is "worse" than gaming though. Not even a tiny bit worse.

I really can't even imagine a reason why anyone would think that unless we're talking about getting shitfaced drunk and/or stoned, but that's really not much different than someone who's been chugging Mountain Dew and gaming for 24 hours+, and I have seen gamers do that, a lot too, not just a few times.

At that point it's fair to say it's an addictive behavior that's unhealthy.

Re: Ask HN: How to keep my daughter busy while tickling her curiosity

#213

Post by Akronymus »

credit_guy wrote: post #76

My son is 12 y/o, and he's into Minecraft. Yesterday he discovered the server mc.openredstone.org. He spent all day yesterday and about one hour today, and he ended up building a 4-bit adder. On this server players learn how to build logic gates, and mix them so they eventually build CPUs. It's fully gamified, so beginners are called "students" and more advanced players are called "builders". To become a "builder" yo…

mazbe this could be to your sons liking?

https://nandgame.com/

Re: Ask HN: How to keep my daughter busy while tickling her curiosity

#214

Post by Akronymus »

thendrill wrote: post #119
brailsafe wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been programming for 15 years and had to google what NAND was. Had a sense of XOR

You would be surprised how much more relevant info programmers miss... Example, most programmers I know have no idea when a variable gets allocated on the stack and when it's on the heap. Let's not talk about how many dont even know what a (stack overflow)[ https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stack_buffer_overflow ] is...

Diving into reverse engineering taught me just how little I know about assembly/call conventions and such. But it is highly educational.

Re: Ask HN: How to keep my daughter busy while tickling her curiosity

#216

Post by Akronymus »

andrepd wrote: post #191
social_quotient wrote: post #65

Might be off topic but a nugget from having two girls (5 and 11). Kids don’t care about budget or how much things cost. We have toys we’ve spent hundreds of dollars on only to have the near free to free one be a hit. I say this to make sure you know your employment status likely only effects your kids if it effects you. Or said differently, to the extent it effects you it will effect them. Kids will generally have fu…

> I say this to make sure you know your employment status likely only effects your kids if it effects you That's partially true but there are also things for some hobbies/activities which are really expensive. I'm thinking musical instruments (+lessons), or robotics (okay, those were very expensive when I was a kid but maybe they're cheaper now :p).

> robotics

that takes me back. Using NxC on a Lego NXT. One of the bigger reasons I moved towards programming.

Re: Ask HN: How to keep my daughter busy while tickling her curiosity

#217

Post by circlefavshape »

mlyle wrote: post #97
circlefavshape wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds plausible, but IME doesn't actually work with real kids

Eh. I'm a teacher these days, and it works with real kids. With my own kids, who know the range of possibility and aren't quite so believing in my authority as that of a real teacher, it's still effective but less so. [It works to get class buy-in, even if you are offering meh choice A and awful choice B. A class that has chosen "A" will be more engaged doing it than if you just told them to do A... but you'd better…

Might it simply be the social setting that makes it work in a class and not with your own kids? At a work offsite I'm happy enough to choose between a walking tour or a brewery visit as mandatory fun, but if I'm the same city with my wife we're probably gonna do something different

Has literally never worked with my kids (now aged 17 and 13) fwiw.

Re: Ask HN: How to keep my daughter busy while tickling her curiosity

#219

Post by jjice »

oblib wrote: post #141

I became a single parent when my daughter turned 1 year old. When she got old enough we'd go fishing, bicycling, swimming, and hiking a lot. We'd also go to a used book store twice a month (on pay day) so she could pick out a few books to read. She loved doing that. She had no interest at all in learning how to code or gaming but she loved helping in the garden and in the kitchen prepping and cooking meals. When she…

First off, great on you.

Second, I love the idea of giving your child access to as many used books as they can handle and the library. Used books are often very cheap in my experience, and the value a child will get out of that book we bought for $3 is extremely worth it. The library is also a great (and better) option, especially if there's one in walking distance.

As someone who is comfortable middle class, I'll do my best to always get my child a used book if they're going to read it. With a quick search on Ebay, you can get each of the Lord of the Rings books for ~$4 each, and that's including shipping. You seriously can't beat books as entertainment for cost and childhood development wins. That said, if the library is across town - we'll take that route.

Re: Ask HN: How to keep my daughter busy while tickling her curiosity

#220

Post by mlyle »

circlefavshape wrote: post #217
mlyle wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eh. I'm a teacher these days, and it works with real kids. With my own kids, who know the range of possibility and aren't quite so believing in my authority as that of a real teacher, it's still effective but less so. [It works to get class buy-in, even if you are offering meh choice A and awful choice B. A class that has chosen "A" will be more engaged doing it than if you just told them to do A... but you'd better…

Might it simply be the social setting that makes it work in a class and not with your own kids? At a work offsite I'm happy enough to choose between a walking tour or a brewery visit as mandatory fun, but if I'm the same city with my wife we're probably gonna do something different Has literally never worked with my kids (now aged 17 and 13) fwiw.

> Might it simply be the social setting that makes it work in a class and not with your own kids?

Oh, totally. It does work with my kids somewhat, but there has to be at least a minimal reason for constraint and at least some desirability of the options. At school, constraint is expected and things that are not entirely fun are tolerated.

Asking A or B for breakfast as someone else pointed out, when they're not interested in eating, isn't going to do anything.

Also--my wife and I do the "A or B --- or -you- propose something" with each other. Prevents just absently saying "nah" to a long list of options.

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