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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

#41

Post by Symbiote »

samatman wrote: post #39
dcsommer wrote: post #29

I love this idea! I can't wait to try it with my son when he gets a couple months older. By the way, what you have there is a glockenspiel. A xylophone is made with wooden bars, not metal as you have. It's a common mistake!

I'm aware of what the xylo- in xylophone means. But words mean what we use them to mean, not what pedants insist upon, and in vernacular, you're wrong, not him: the meaning of xylophone includes metallic instruments in the same style. In musicology, sure, these distinctions are useful there. But what I want to stress is that you are wrong in this context. Not technically correct: wrong. The only mistake was you choos…

I knew both words when I was about 5, as we had both instruments at the back of the classroom.

Your approach leads to calling them all sticks.

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

#43

Post by fieryskiff17 »

samatman wrote: post #39
dcsommer wrote: post #29

I love this idea! I can't wait to try it with my son when he gets a couple months older. By the way, what you have there is a glockenspiel. A xylophone is made with wooden bars, not metal as you have. It's a common mistake!

I'm aware of what the xylo- in xylophone means. But words mean what we use them to mean, not what pedants insist upon, and in vernacular, you're wrong, not him: the meaning of xylophone includes metallic instruments in the same style. In musicology, sure, these distinctions are useful there. But what I want to stress is that you are wrong in this context. Not technically correct: wrong. The only mistake was you choos…

[dead]

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

#44

Post by neilkk »

samatman wrote: post #39
dcsommer wrote: post #29

I love this idea! I can't wait to try it with my son when he gets a couple months older. By the way, what you have there is a glockenspiel. A xylophone is made with wooden bars, not metal as you have. It's a common mistake!

I'm aware of what the xylo- in xylophone means. But words mean what we use them to mean, not what pedants insist upon, and in vernacular, you're wrong, not him: the meaning of xylophone includes metallic instruments in the same style. In musicology, sure, these distinctions are useful there. But what I want to stress is that you are wrong in this context. Not technically correct: wrong. The only mistake was you choos…

No, you are wrong and the GP is right.

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

#46

Post by samatman »

neilkk wrote: post #44
samatman wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm aware of what the xylo- in xylophone means. But words mean what we use them to mean, not what pedants insist upon, and in vernacular, you're wrong, not him: the meaning of xylophone includes metallic instruments in the same style. In musicology, sure, these distinctions are useful there. But what I want to stress is that you are wrong in this context. Not technically correct: wrong. The only mistake was you choos…

No, you are wrong and the GP is right.

Incorrect.

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

#47

Post by hn_acker »

Symbiote wrote: post #41
samatman wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm aware of what the xylo- in xylophone means. But words mean what we use them to mean, not what pedants insist upon, and in vernacular, you're wrong, not him: the meaning of xylophone includes metallic instruments in the same style. In musicology, sure, these distinctions are useful there. But what I want to stress is that you are wrong in this context. Not technically correct: wrong. The only mistake was you choos…

I knew both words when I was about 5, as we had both instruments at the back of the classroom. Your approach leads to calling them all sticks.

> Your approach leads to calling them all sticks.

No, it leads to calling them all xylophones. Or calling the metal ones metal xylophones (which I do only if I remember that "xylophone" is the wrong term) and the wooden ones wooden xylophones (which I don't want to do but am stupid enough to do).

> I knew both words when I was about 5, as we had both instruments at the back of the classroom.

Even so, remembering that different words can exist for different instruments with the same general shape but differing other characteristics (wood vs. metal bar material, in this case) is a waste of mental effort for people who have reliable eyes (like me) and don't practice those instruments (also me).

I call the piano the "piano", even though the more functionally accurate term (also more historically accurate) is pianoforte. Even though I know this, I'm still going to call the piano a piano, because I don't want to bother to remember that the word "pianoforte" exists until someone asks me "why is it called piano?" As for tomato, I've learned to accept that a tomato can be a "fruit" in some contexts and a "vegetable" in some contexts (not mutually exclusive).

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

#48

Post by hahajk »

ca_tech wrote: post #21
TeMPOraL wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

I wish I could find the source, but I'll relay it less eloquently. Children have a remarkable ability to ask for things they know they can't have. Their innocence gives them the audacity to ask for the impossible. This always stuck with me. I sometimes catch myself when I self-curate questions to eliminate what I "know" will be impossible. It also has led me to sometimes just say "yes" when I get those questions, jus…

I wonder if it's because the average parent is not a very sophisticated bureaucrat. We get tired and just say yes because we need to survive. As children get older and interface with more institutions that have teams of people to tell you no (or no process to even ask), we enter a learned helplessness: a no today is almost certainly a no tomorrow.

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

#49

Post by PebblesRox »

This is a great new addition to my collection of low-budget screen-free ways to teach programming concepts to little kids.[0]

We don't have a xylophone but I might just have to get one so we can try out this game - I love it!

[0]https://twitter.com/CBancos/status/1581662053189574656

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

#50

Post by PebblesRox »

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 have a short collection of ideas here.[0] The biggest thing I've done is tell bedtime stories (often collaboratively) that incorporate topics like functions, negative numbers, and debugging. Here's one where we did FizzBuzz together. [1]

[0]https://twitter.com/CBancos/status/1581662053189574656

[1]https://bancosparenting.wordpress.com/2023/02/04/pickle-and-...

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