If I had to pick just one thing that Scratch gets right that other programming languages should strive for, it would be the immediacy with which a beginning programmer can get compelling results through trying things. I've seen many would-be programmers lose interest because the process to get a desired result is too abstract and prolonged; the inertia is too great. The ability to get results quickly reinforces further exploration of the system. Novices can build up to an understanding of data structures, algorithms, and how to structure code.
Scratch Helps Kids Get With the Program
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Re: Scratch Helps Kids Get With the Program
#12I turned my daughter on to this at age 4 and within an hour she had figured out loops, variable and collision detection. I'm particularly impressed with the way they modeled loops, which is always a hard thing to explain to new developers. The only problem we had to do with the amount of screen real estate needed, she had a 12" iBook with a 1024x768 display and it was almost unusably cramped. On modern machines, I'm…
I'm particularly impressed with the way they modeled loops, which is always a hard thing to explain to new developers.
I remember trying to learn Perl from one of the O'Reily books when I was 11 or 12. I was following the examples and generally enjoying myself until I came to one with a while loop. I was ticked off that it was looping automatically and I couldn't see why. I was expecting that I needed to say when to go back to the beginning of the block. ...maybe c would have been better then.