Is Python The New Basic? ("Python For Kids") • Hacker News Board

Re: Is Python The New Basic? ("Python For Kids")

#51

Post by modernise » Mon, Dec 03, 2012, 12:28 AM UTC

RodgerTheGreat wrote: post #9

For someone who already knows how to program, Python seems to be very easy to pick up. It's still a tremendously more complex language than BASIC. I help teach an after-school programming class for middle schoolers. Last year, we tried using Python. While some students got the hang of it, many seemed confused and demotivated. This year, I wrote a simple TinyBASIC REPL from scratch[1], aiming to produce the simplest s…

Remember those laptops for African kids? They integrated Python for learning to program. I only watched the video, back then, but I remember them showing the Python console.

  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_Laptop_per_Child
  
  Pippy https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7aQxYuKJ18
  Turtle Art https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i2MblcmwWo8

Re: Is Python The New Basic? ("Python For Kids")

#52

Post by teilo » Mon, Dec 03, 2012, 1:44 AM UTC

ConstantineXVI wrote: post #13

The one key difference between BASIC and (python lua javascript & etc) has nothing to do with the language at all: modern computers don't boot straight in to a REPL. Anyone who used a C64 more than likely knows a little BASIC, can't say the same for naive Windows or Mac users.

Agreed. Tandy Color Computer 2 for me (with Extended Basic ROM upgrade - Oh Joy!), but same deal. Natural transition from there to QuickBasic (not QBasic!) running on a 386SX and the world of compilers and runtimes. Between QuickBasic and Python there was a blur of other languages which I have mostly forgotten.

But were it now for the REPL, I would likely not be a programmer today.

Re: Is Python The New Basic? ("Python For Kids")

#53

Post by RodgerTheGreat » Mon, Dec 03, 2012, 2:57 AM UTC

modernise wrote: post #51

RodgerTheGreat wrote: post #9

For someone who already knows how to program, Python seems to be very easy to pick up. It's still a tremendously more complex language than BASIC. I help teach an after-school programming class for middle schoolers. Last year, we tried using Python. While some students got the hang of it, many seemed confused and demotivated. This year, I wrote a simple TinyBASIC REPL from scratch[1], aiming to produce the simplest s…

Remember those laptops for African kids? They integrated Python for learning to program. I only watched the video, back then, but I remember them showing the Python console. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_Laptop_per_Child Pippy https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7aQxYuKJ18 Turtle Art https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i2MblcmwWo8

Interestingly, OLPCs also come preloaded with a Forth environment by virtue of the fact that they use OpenFirmware: http://wiki.laptop.org/go/FORTH