Ask HN: Are there any good “coding for kids” books?
Like most of you I learned to code as a kid with adult resources. But my children are nearly ready to learn to code and I am considering that maybe there could be some better resources available now. However most of the books I've seen that are made for kids are too simple and obfuscate important details. So, are there actually any good kids coding books?
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[ 808 ms ] story [ 1669 ms ] threadhttps://usborne.com/gb/books/browse-by-category/science-and-...
The official Raspberry Pi magazine website make all their issues available free to download as PDFs. Each issue is full of tutorials. (Obviously requires a Raspberry Pi) :
https://magpi.raspberrypi.com/issues
Minecraft education edition (and even general Minecraft) is good at the lower level.
https://archive.org/details/pdfy-MgN0H1joIoDVoIC7
Dr. Johnson used to condemn me for putting Newbery’s books into children’s hands. “Babies do not want,” said he, “to hear about babies; they like to be told of giants and castles, and of somewhat which can stretch and stimulate their little minds.” When I would urge the numerous editions of Tommy Prudent or Goody Two Shoes; “Remember always,” said he, “that the parents buy the books, and that the children never read them. – Mrs Thrale, Anecdotes of the Late Samuel Johnson
On the other hand, I now have a new book to read!
Of course a book about good or planning/organizing I think might make a great starter for a kid you want to become a good programmer. I have seen some a few already burn out (Even in childhood, often it's an adult pressure getting these kids into coding) however, without the organizational skills learned first, when things get even a little complex, the kids buried or set back by the lack of some formal reasoning or lack of organizational skill.
It’s got state, conditonals, loops, stacks, maybe even concurrency with multiplayer. All wrapped up in a fun game with cool art and lore.
If you can resolve a deep stack in Magic, that’s pretty much like keeping track of procedural code in your head.
Downside is it can get very expensive.
https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/amp/usborne-coding-books
Nothing else comes close. Just install some open source version of Basic and you’re good to go.
[1] https://computationaltales.blogspot.com/p/book.html
I've got two children (8 & 11) and done lots of volunteering teaching programming to children (and teach on a computer science degree as well!). I think a lot depends on the age and what you want them to learn.
Considerations: Do they read fluently? How is their typing? What sort of things do they actually want to programme? What is it that you want them to learn? Are you going to sit down with them and go through the book or just leave them to it?
There are a lot of resources these days that aren't books too which may be better. There are lots of online 'lessons' if you look at e.g. Code Club or Hour of Code. You've got games like CodeCombat and Erase All Kittens. There are lots of programmable toys of the robotic variety. You can get them doing stuff with Microbits or raspberry pis - the SenseHat is quite fun for example.
Not a programming book, but my older son really enjoyed Computational Fairy Tales by Jeremy Kubica.
I also wouldn't be too put off by some things being made simple. In a sense as a parent, you are trying to motivate them as much as teach them. And as a programmer yourself, you are in a good place if you want to say to them 'actually it's a bit more complicated than the book makes out'.
Thinking back, even in the dark ages one of my gateways to programming was a programmable toy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Trak
I just wanted to tell people about anime and make weird things like site counters that used letters instead of numbers or guest books so that people who couldn't code/afford the internet time for chat rooms could still talk about cool stuff. It turned out I had a knack for it and later I liked to help with things like emulation and make game mods or web stuff for fandom communities.
I wouldn't have read a computer science book as a kid (and I was a VERY nerdy child who was a hyperlexic mental calculator). I agree that learning by doing is good, especially since when you run into a programming problem, you usually don't solve it by finding a book on the problem. So starting with projects also lets them practice problem-solving, which is a HUGE part of programming.
This work makes a difference!
Today, the barrier is so much higher, so while you could still get them to play in python (not ideal and really complex compared to BASIC) and maybe scratch, there's a really visible gap of what they can achieve without significant effort and steep learning curve.
I'm a bit more convinced that maybe going the route of scripted minecraft or roblox or even Horizon if you are into VR is probably the best way to get kids into programming.
I would like to do stuff like that but don’t want to spend dozens of hours fooling around just to get the basics.
https://pbskids.org/learn/scratchjr/
https://github.com/jackdoe/programming-for-kids
Pretty outdated, of course, but still a surprisingly accessible way to learn.
Programming is just steps to do a task and a computer is a thing that can repeat those steps - you don't need a book to explain it - I just did it in a few sentences.
The only proper way to learn something is for it to be useful in your life. If there are games or opportunities to modify games using some scripting languages - kids will want to learn it.
Books are not fun for most kids, so you're going about it wrong - if you can't make it fun for them without books, you've already failed.
Books are good for additional information and a reference, after you've been taught something by a good teacher. They are a bad tool for learning just about everything.
[0]:https://www.helloruby.com/
My kid loves books but not much out there in toddler programming related board books. Also been pushing duplo legos and play dough which seem somehow programming related, no idea why. And someone gave him a linux penguin (tux) plush.
Other than that not sure where to go next. Maybe hes ready for a pi but I dont know about any special linux distros for kids.
There is an electric train for duplo lego, maybe that is a little bit like programming when you plan the tracks.
The baby loves science [2] series is great.
When my daughter was younger I tried reading Lauren Ipsum to her but she didn’t sit still so we read something else. Some point later we were able to read through it and she was excited to hear the chapter the next night.
I only have a data point of 1, but it doesn’t matter what, just read to your kid. If you have access I’d recommend going to the library and getting a variety of books, about whatever they show interest in at the moment. I think I’ve read probably every animal book in the kids section of our library. Our daughter is in Kindergarten this year and they have a STEM class where they are doing hour of code and I’m looking forward to exploring with her as she shows interest and she’s very excited about it. Every kid is different and has different interests and none of us have an opportunity to raise enough kids to really be considered an expert, so take this for what it’s worth.
[1] https://inedo.com/abc [2] https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/566615/baby-loves-c... [3] https://nostarch.com/laurenipsum
After that, I'd point them at Pico-8 https://www.lexaloffle.com/pico-8.php
I didn't start learning to code until I was 27. I think probably the most compelling reason to teach your kids to code is so that you can work on projects with them and have that shared interest.
But, of course, that could backfire. My dad was interested in antiques, opera, gothic architecture, etc and tried to force that down my throat. I couldn't stand it and that made me rebel hard against it.
Your kids might just want to be different people than their parents, or maybe they really are interested in the things you're interested. I don't know. I say try to expose them to a bunch of different things, not just what you like. Maybe they'll make great software engineers, or maybe they want to become marketeers or lawyers or designers. If you encourage good social, communication, and learning skills, they'll be successful in whatever career path most interests them.
Sorry, I get a little uppity when people start talking about teaching kids to code.
I'm a child who learned to code with adult resources as well, and the only reason I stuck with it is that I was making things. Stupid, silly things, but it hooked me for life. I also liked the social aspect: I was a rural child who had nobody else around who liked nerd stuff other than my parents, and I was more than willing to learn to code if it meant I could have friends and not be bored like I was in school.
I can't recall ever using a book, actually. It was mostly documentation + discussions. I'd actually say it might be better to take them through projects and when you get stuck, show them how to look up the answer to their problem. That's what devs do in the real world.
One new feature is that it lets you build apps and submit them to the App Store with just an iPad. No Mac required.
We're adding more paths soon, including a More Python path and an Introduction to Unity path.
The paths build up skills and then build up independence.
Kids can start with Scratch then move on to Python etc/