I mean it’s your interest and that’s cool and all, but your child is not you and won’t be because they can’t be. Even if you became a programmer because your parents were programmers and you just followed in the family business...but if that were the case you probably wouldn’t be asking because you would have first hand experience.

It’s great to share your interest because sharing your interest means spending time with your child and that’s what your child wants and needs. And will even once they are into adulthood if you do things right.

But honestly, fishing is a better way to spend time together because both of you will remember it longer and more fondly than sitting at a screen.

And later you will be glad for the ways your child is not like you and the ways they are like you only better.

It goes fast but it’s a long time still. Not a sprint to be the top seventh grader.

Good luck.

When I was writing my first lines of code there was no distraction in form of social media apps and the technologies were pretty simple and accessible.

If you now aim to create a webpage which you say least resemble what you are used to seeing on the web, uploading an HTML to a popular free hosting sites is just not enough.

I would like my kids find their way to whatever they like to do. I am worried though that they will waste their time even worse than I did back in my days, because the web is more addictive and getting involved in creating it is much more difficult then ever before.

It will turn out ok.

The web is no longer dominated by amateurs and DIY projects.

But Youtube and TicTock and Facebook and Instagram are...not that those are what the kids are on much.

Creative opportunities abound and are more accessible than ever before...an iPhone shoots 4k stabilized video, has a linear editor, and GarageBand. Of course it can't compete with today's Hollywood. And that's how the web has become...except that we haven't had a century of people finding a non-corporate aesthetic for web content....we haven't had a century to develop a cultural eye for non-professional websites in the way we have for moving images.

There will be plenty (too much) of time for screens in their adulthood. Teach them the joys of play while they are young.

What’s important is not what you’re spending time together on, but that you are spending time together at all and you’re both engaged in it.

When I played video games with them...first Lego Star Wars and later FIFA...it was distinct from my "getting your kids to program" attempts that involved Alice and Processing and Common Lisp and Boxed Knuth progressively...the last meaning they are fully equipped to get as deeply into programing as their interest and ability might take them.

I used fishing because as a new parent an older parent came into my office on their business and because part of my job was positive customer service taking time to chat was ok and the older parent learned I was I new parent and told me I would never regret time spent fishing together and because my spidy sense told me to trust them I did and they were correct.

Growing up in the south, I've known a lot of people who were recovering from fishing as something their parents tried "to do to get their kids to fish." There's a qualitative difference between an afternoon gone fishing and getting up early for a fishing trip I think.

That difference is whether the terms are mutual and the relationship equal. Whether the goal is the time together or ambition fulfillment.

I don't think my kids should necessarily be software engineers just as I don't care whether they choose writing as a vocation. But they don't get to choose if they learn to write. I think programming is increasingly like writing in this way.

But by the time they leave home, my kids will know how to write well, how to learn a foreign language, how to program, and math fundamentals (algebra, stats, basic calculus).

As such, they'll have the foundation to study whatever they want to in college.

Already well on their way there.

For teaching basic logic to kids/teens, I found this game really enjoyable, especially since it's tangible and offline: https://www.turingtumble.com/

These are also a good way to illustrate math concepts visually.

[1] https://www.lego.com/en-us/service/help/products/electronics...

[2] https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLj_k_RHuTqaUojvL-J76TVjG2...

I’d disagree it’s less accessible. I think it’s way more accessible than when I was a kid and had to copy the games out of the back of Amiga BASIC magazine. We have tons of free text and video content on how to learn just about any language, free IDEs, and easily downloaded platforms/compilers etc. if anything the problem is that it’s hard to choose.

There is also a list on GitHub that might be interesting for you: https://github.com/HollyAdele/awesome-programming-for-kids

[1] https://www.primotoys.com/cubetto

Some other things she uses to encourage programming in the group - bitsbox, code.org and Tynker (younger kids).

I have seen all kids participate and learn with a variety of these options over the past 12 months (remote works really well). I'll get more details from her later today if there's interest.

As a pretty young kid, I got into GameMaker, and got my first taste of programming logic.

In middle school, one of my grandparents bought me a Raspberry Pi, which got me into Linux and Python, neither of which I had a strong need for at that point in time, but which have both made quite a large impact on my life trajectory by now.

In highschool, I programmed my calculator (TI-83 ftw!) because I got tired of doing geometry homework.

My honest recommendation is to find out his interest (games for me), available mentorship (RasPi), or need (math for me), and then show how programming can help.

I should point out that I'm pretty young, probably closer to your son's age then your own. Maybe close to equidistant.

Tonight when he called me he asked if he could have an old Java coding book he found in the basement. Apparently he's been "Hacking" the school computers by editing the HTML on different web pages to add shrek IMG tags.

I talked him through installing notepad++ and the JRE, but also had him install python so he could try the REPL.

He was able to do a quick

>a=4

>b=8

>a+b

12

I'm super proud of him. My daughter (9) was also following along, got notepad++ installed and was apparently working on a HUGE code:)

I'm super proud of her too.

Kids have their own interests. You can support what they want to do or explore, but can't really make them interested in programming if they arent. There's no rule that says your kids will be interested in the same things you are.

Figure out what kind of goals your kids have and how programming can get them there. Then show them.