[Year 12 Its] Ideas for starting programming

[Guy Flaherty]

Hi Frank,

Take a look at the links in Tony's post. They cover a lot of interesting 
stuff. A few more I like are:

http://www.djangoproject.org
A web framework that makes building web apps a breeze! Honestly, I have been 
using this extensively and it makes things fun again! We were building all 
our apps in PHP or Java before and it was pretty monotonous and boring. With 
Django, you can produce excellent database-backed apps in a very short time. 
I thoroughly recommend it.

http://pythonchallenge.com/index.htm
The Python challenge is a very interesting programming challenge that you will 
either love or get bored with very quickly. You get clues to a puzzle that 
you can only solve by using python programming! Might be a little hard for 
students, but may be of interest to teachers who like cryptic challenges or 
puzzles that test their basic programming skills!

http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/Python/Cookbook/
The Python Cookbook is chocked full of 'recipes' that can help you to learn 
the language. Some complex, some simple, but a wealth of examples of how to 
solve problems!

http://www.limsi.fr/Individu/pointal/python/pqrc/
The Python Quick Reference Card. This is a fantastic resource for teachers and 
anyone using Python. Download it and print it out in colour and you get an 
excellent reference card that covers a huge amount in 16 A4 pages. Great for 
when students ask you something you are not familiar with or when you can't 
remember an option for a command!

I heartily recommend you give Python a try if you haven't already. It isn't 
right for everything but it is extremely flexible and works well on Win, Mac 
and Linux. Google, Apple, Yahoo and many other well known companies have 
really started to rely on Python to get things done. Even game companies are 
starting to see the benefit of cross platform with games like World of 
Warcraft making use of Python.

Personally, Python is a pleasure to work with and is a fantastic tool to have 
in the classroom. This year I taught IS with Python, PyQT, Eric3 (as the IDE) 
and a linux Virtual Machine image to students with a VB background. Didn't 
cost the school or the students a cent. Works well.

Cheers,
Guy Flaherty

On Monday 13 November 2006 12:52, Frank Merlino wrote:
> Sorry Mark...the email was for GUY!!
> The pressures of marking are getting to me!!
>
> Regards,
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: is-bounces at edulists.com.au [mailto:is-bounces at edulists.com.au]On
> Behalf Of Frank Merlino
> Sent: Monday, 13 November 2006 12:39 PM
> To: Year 12 Information Technology Systems Teachers' Mailing List
> Subject: RE: [Year 12 Its] Ideas for starting programming
>
>
>
> Mark,
> Sound interesting. I would like more info on the language.
>
> Regards,
> frank
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: is-bounces at edulists.com.au [mailto:is-bounces at edulists.com.au]On
> Behalf Of Guy Flaherty
> Sent: Monday, 13 November 2006 12:23 PM
> To: Year 12 Information Technology Systems Teachers' Mailing List
> Subject: Re: [Year 12 Its] Ideas for starting programming
>
>
> Mark,
>
> You might like to take a look at python and in particular the excellent
> pygame library for teaching students how to program. Not only do you get an
> outstanding programming language that is ideally suited to learning how to
> program and available for just about any platform/OS you can throw at it,
> you also get the added motivation value of making games! All free to use as
> much as you like with lots of possibility to grow and expand as you find
> new areas of interest. Python is a fantastic language to teach with and its
> simplicity yet flexibility are making it a very popular 'beginner's
> programming language'.
>
> If you are interested and looking for resources, or anyone else for that
> matter, let me know and I can point you to plenty of information to get you
> started.
>
> Good luck with deciding :)
>
> Guy Flaherty
> Information Systems
> Xavier College
>
> On Monday 13 November 2006 09:51, Mark Kelly wrote:
> > Hi all.  My SoD kids will probably be starting with zero programming
> > experience and I was tossing around ideas for a kick-off point.
> >
> > So far I've thought of Microworlds (Logo) - they did in in year 7 so it
> > should be a warm and fuzzy reminder of their childhoods  :-)
> >
> > And Lego Mindstorms - they can program cars and robots.
> >
> > Then they might be ready to go to VB or similar.
> >
> > What do you guys use to kickstart programming?
> >
> > Mark
>
> _______________________________________________
> http://www.edulists.com.au
> IT Systems Mailing List kindly supported by
> http://www.vcaa.vic.edu.au - Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority
> and http://www.vitta.org.au  - VITTA Victorian Information Technology
> Teachers Association Inc
>
> _______________________________________________
> http://www.edulists.com.au
> IT Systems Mailing List kindly supported by
> http://www.vcaa.vic.edu.au - Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority
> and http://www.vitta.org.au  - VITTA Victorian Information Technology
> Teachers Association Inc
>
> _______________________________________________
> http://www.edulists.com.au
> IT Systems Mailing List kindly supported by
> http://www.vcaa.vic.edu.au - Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority
> and http://www.vitta.org.au  - VITTA Victorian Information Technology
> Teachers Association Inc