I have a niece (10) and nephew (13) who are both into video games and I''d like to expose them to programming. I haven''t looked at programming books lately; but does anyone recommend one (probably C and/or C++) for beginning youngsters? Thanks, Mike

I would be interested in this as well. A friend asked me this question, but where an 11 year old should start assuming just a math education appropriate to his age is a mystery to me. He is into logic problems such as who lives next to who given the following conditions so it seems he should be ready to start programming.

by exposing them to programming you''ll have to also take into account that everything new they learn in that programming book, they''ll transfer over into anything that it applies to in their lives (math, logic, exc.) but it will be through that books ''filter'' that they learn it.

I learned dos when i was like ??? 6? 7?... i had no idea what the directory tree was... i just knew that these files that you run are in these directories that you get to by going to c drive ( c: ) changing directory to the program dir ( cd\program ) and typing the name of the file ( program )... the problem is, when i learn the real thing about what the filesystem is.. i''ll have to relearn all my logic to see it correctly... you''re viewing it in a box... through a ''filter''...

That said, you''ll have to decide whether to teach them from the ground up, or learn through the book. the advantage of teaching them the stuff early is that they''ll have that to stand on when learning the base stuff later... they''ll still be ahead in knowelede even if the concept it slightly skewed/flawed...

all in all, i think it was good for me to learn dos at an early age... it helped me later to understand the filesystem (i think anyway)

as for books.. i don''t know

as for languages, c is kinda different... i started in vb and have found that the further you get into that, the closer it resembles c perhaps that is a good start w/o haveing to cram c up their ear

-mike

ps. just my 2 cents (ok, maybe 3, dang.. that was a long message)

get them MindRover, it is a programming video game. Download the demo (mindrover.com) and try it out. It is a visual programming system, where you drag lines (method calls) between squares (objects). Then you have your rover race/battle with other rovers.

Try C for Dummies - it''s a very entertaining and good book; I read it at 12 or so.


Mike

I saw a book once that came with that Games Studio software. It talked about basic game design first and then went into specifics about how to use them with that environment. I''ll see if I can find the name tonight when I''m at home and post it for ya tomorrow.


BeS
It''s Da BOMB Baby!!!

My parents just got my 13 year old brother this packaged deal for christmas. It comes with editors and all that for building the game first off, then moves into the details of actually building a game yourself. Best of all it''s in Visual Basic which is GREAT for younger people who just want to see things happen instead of dealing with theory.
So what I''m saying is..

Get them a Visual Basic Programming Book for simple games, this will hold their interest long enough.

Sorry can''t remember the name of the packaged deal, though I do know they got it at Best Buy. The book used DirectX and Visual Basic.

You might want to try the Lego Mindstorms toys as an interesting way of kids learning programming. If you haven''t heard of this then it''s basically a Lego set that allows children (even big ones) to build all manner of robots.

The robots can be anything from simple moon rovers with obstacle sensors to really complex specialists set up to perform certain tasks (sorting the lego bricks).

Where the programming comes into this is that the robots must be programmed by special PC software supplied with the kit. In it''s basic form this is a visual programming language, where the child develops a flowchart type of program.

Moving on from this, there is have been several language compilers written by enthusiasts. At least one of these is almost the same as C, although some are much more exotic. You''ll find that these enthusiasts have also published books to support their work.

If you can afford it, it''s a pretty good way to get a child started. If you go the PC compiler route they might get a little bored with some of the more mundane tasks on the learn to program route.

quote: Original post by freakchild

You might want to try the Lego Mindstorms toys as an interesting way of kids learning programming. If you haven''t heard of this then it''s basically a Lego set that allows children (even big ones) to build all manner of robots.

The robots can be anything from simple moon rovers with obstacle sensors to really complex specialists set up to perform certain tasks (sorting the lego bricks).

Where the programming comes into this is that the robots must be programmed by special PC software supplied with the kit. In it''s basic form this is a visual programming language, where the child develops a flowchart type of program.

Moving on from this, there is have been several language compilers written by enthusiasts. At least one of these is almost the same as C, although some are much more exotic. You''ll find that these enthusiasts have also published books to support their work.

If you can afford it, it''s a pretty good way to get a child started. If you go the PC compiler route they might get a little bored with some of the more mundane tasks on the learn to program route.

The best ones are Quite C (it''s better than NQC) and LegOS. However, I learned C for the PC platform before I started this stuff. That made it easier. If you get a fairly big book on Console Programs, which has stuff like file I/O etc in it, and then show them how to set up the development environment, I''m sure they''ll get it sorted. (I learned C when I was 11, using a command line C compiler. I then got a new C++ book and learned that, for VC++. I briefly learned some MFC, and then I picked up Windows Game Programming For Dummies. That was last year when I was 13.



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So I smiled, and they did.

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why not expose them to basic or vb? that would probably be the best approach. I was programming assembly at 13 =), they''re probably not TOO young.

JoeMont001@aol.com www.polarisoft.n3.net