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The Xylophone Maze: Screen-free coding for children

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Re: The Xylophone Maze: Screen-free coding for children

#11

Post by zoomablemind »

Fun idea! Clear objectives and simple tools. It's also a remote control example.

I find that "algorithmic thinking" is too artificial for young kids. They are very versatile in a richer set of methods, which often are mutually conflicting yet lead to desired result.

Once we played with a programmable mouse that needs to find cheese. Very predictably, the most used button was "do a trick", which makes mouse make funny noise without moving further... Sweet times for the kid, doomed moments for the teacher.

Re: The Xylophone Maze: Screen-free coding for children

#12

Post by xyzzy_plugh »

zoomablemind wrote: post #11

Fun idea! Clear objectives and simple tools. It's also a remote control example. I find that "algorithmic thinking" is too artificial for young kids. They are very versatile in a richer set of methods, which often are mutually conflicting yet lead to desired result. Once we played with a programmable mouse that needs to find cheese. Very predictably, the most used button was "do a trick", which makes mouse make funny…

I would argue young kids are very good at logic and reasoning, but they lack self moderation controls and the context of The Real World.

For example:

Parent: "We're not going to have ice cream today."

3yo: "If we don't have ice cream today, can we have ice cream tomorrow?"

Or, more commonly:

3yo: "What if we have ice cream today and no ice cream tomorrow?"

Re: The Xylophone Maze: Screen-free coding for children

#13

Post by prismatix »

alaintno wrote: post #2

It's an amazing idea! I'm always looking for screen-free activities related to problem solving with my daughter. By the way, if someone happens to have other examples, it would be great to share!

I think the "Peanut Butter Sandwich Instructions" game could fit into this category as well. For kids who can't write, you can do the actions in real time. For kids who can, have them write down instructions first then "run" the program. Teach them to "debug" or test their program along the way.

Re: The Xylophone Maze: Screen-free coding for children

#14

Post by mdonahoe »

My daughter and I play "dadbot" where I'm the robot and she has to give me clear instructions on what I should do. It started after I showed her https://lightbot.com/ but we like the "screen-free" nature of dadbot better.

Eventually she jumps on my back and the game doesn't last much longer because dadbot gets tired.

Re: The Xylophone Maze: Screen-free coding for children

#15

Post by TeMPOraL »

xyzzy_plugh wrote: post #12
zoomablemind wrote: post #11

Fun idea! Clear objectives and simple tools. It's also a remote control example. I find that "algorithmic thinking" is too artificial for young kids. They are very versatile in a richer set of methods, which often are mutually conflicting yet lead to desired result. Once we played with a programmable mouse that needs to find cheese. Very predictably, the most used button was "do a trick", which makes mouse make funny…

I would argue young kids are very good at logic and reasoning, but they lack self moderation controls and the context of The Real World. For example: Parent: "We're not going to have ice cream today." 3yo: "If we don't have ice cream today, can we have ice cream tomorrow?" Or, more commonly: 3yo: "What if we have ice cream today and no ice cream tomorrow?"

Or, even more commonly:

3yo: "What if we have ice cream today and ice cream tomorrow too?". Because small children know better than to constrain themselves to artificially restricted choices offered by parents.

Source: experience from navigating such negotiations for the past 1.5 year with my now almost-5 daughter.

Re: The Xylophone Maze: Screen-free coding for children

#16

Post by flippy_flops »

prismatix wrote: post #13
alaintno wrote: post #2

It's an amazing idea! I'm always looking for screen-free activities related to problem solving with my daughter. By the way, if someone happens to have other examples, it would be great to share!

I think the "Peanut Butter Sandwich Instructions" game could fit into this category as well. For kids who can't write, you can do the actions in real time. For kids who can, have them write down instructions first then "run" the program. Teach them to "debug" or test their program along the way.

Every year I teach a few weeks of "coding" at my kids elementary school. I always start with the Peanut Butter Sandwich and it's a huge hit. For time's sake, i print & cut out 30-40 random instructions like "openTheBag();" or "holdJellyOverBread();". They get in 4 groups, choose which instructions to use, and put them in order.

Re: The Xylophone Maze: Screen-free coding for children

#19

Post by SamBam »

I played Robot Turtles [1] with my kids, a boardgame with a similar idea: The kid can lay out cards that define what the turtle should do, and the adult moves the turtle exactly as instructed. Slightly different because, like in the original Logo, you can say "turn left" or "turn right," and it can be hard for the kids to remember that left and right are from the perspective of the turtle, whichever way they are currently facing.

By about age 7 or 8 it stopped being fun, because the kids could pretty much lay out an entire one-shot sequence of cards that solved the maze. (We never really got into trying to code "functions," it never quite seemed to be intuitive in the context of the game.)

1. http://www.robotturtles.com/

Re: The Xylophone Maze: Screen-free coding for children

#20

Post by throwaway89201 »

mdonahoe wrote: post #14

My daughter and I play "dadbot" where I'm the robot and she has to give me clear instructions on what I should do. It started after I showed her https://lightbot.com/ but we like the "screen-free" nature of dadbot better. Eventually she jumps on my back and the game doesn't last much longer because dadbot gets tired.

The first (Flash) version is playable here: https://dagobah.net/flash/light-bot.swf

It has a pretty steep learning curve if you're not experienced with building a program step-by-step from another perspective and you're only able to run it. The mobile version is a lot more gentle and has more content, but I think less challenging and less fun.

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