[Yr7-10it] Scratch, Gamemaker, VB.net, Python, PHP and MySQL - Programming for all levels

[Bill Kerr]

There is both some overlap and need to explain more (similarities /
differences) b/w my list and tony's list

plus a few important things are left off both our lists:

   - the language has been designed with children's learning
   developmental needs taken into consideration (logo pioneered this perhaps)
   - ability to run the finished product on the web
   - good, cheap resource materials available for educators / teachers

tony: "easy entry level programming with drag and drop programming"
bill: "good visual drag and drop of some type"

The drag and drop candidates are game maker, scratch and etoys (there maybe
some others?)
my ranking of easy entry for those brought up on conventional interfaces
would be  scratch, then game maker then etoys
etoys is unconventional with its morphic interface but which I think is
better, so there is a steeper initial learning / adaptation curve for those
brought up on a conventional windows GUI

tony: "top end extensibility through fully featured text based programming"
bill: "low entry - high ceiling"

The transition from visual (easier but limited) to text is important even
though you can do a hell of a lot with the visual languages mentioned above.
I would like to investigate this issue more but at the moment would be
inclined to agree with tony that game maker wins out here. From what I know
scratch is a non starter and doesn't offer high ceiling. Etoys is good in
this respect - you make scripts from tiles and you can observe the text code
with one click. Game maker is similar when I think about it - one click to
see the pseudo code of what the drag and drop has made. The transition from
etoys to the more advanced smalltalk programming is far from smooth; in some
respects they are two different programs co-existing within the same
program. Developmental work on new versions of etoys is going ahead as we
speak though. That leaves game maker where at least the visual programming
and the text code can co-exist readily in the same program.

tony: "licencing which allows kids to continue to work at home for free"
bill: "ability to share fully with other children in the world, rich or poor
(ie. open source,  multi-lingual, its on the OLPC)"

One of the problems with game makers free version accompanied with a more
advanced proprietary version is that if you want to share with everyone
(including poor kids who live in Africa) you then have to restrict yourself
to the tools available in the free version. I became frustrated with this
when making africa country game. Game maker free version only offers arrays
for storing storing and manipulating data. To access the other data
structures (stacks, queues, lists, maps and priority queues) you need to
proprietary version. I don't like the idea of being restricted in what I can
share with those who can't afford it.

btw I read the article that tony linked to:
Objective Comparison of Languages for Teaching Introductory Programming

I think it's a poor article but it did bring home to me the difficulties
involved for teachers in selecting a programming language for use with
students. Not only is there a lot of languages to choose from there is also
a lot of different opinions about "objective comparisons"

- Bill
-- 
Bill Kerr
http://billkerr2.blogspot.com/
http://www.users.on.net/~billkerr/ <http://www.users.on.net/%7Ebillkerr/>
skype: billkerr2006



On 9/15/07, Tony Forster < forster at ozonline.com.au> wrote:
>
> Bill wrote:
> "here's my list, which is what inclines me towards  etoys  / squeak:"
>
> An alternate list:
> easy entry level programming with drag and drop programming
> a true versatile programming environment, not just selecting from limited
> scenarios
> top end extensibility through fully featured text based programming
> licencing which allows kids to continue to work at home for free
> http://tonyforster.blogspot.com/2007_02_01_archive.html
> Game programming tools
>
> or
> An Objective Comparison of Languages for Teaching Introductory Programming
> http://www.it.uu.se/research/group/upcerg/Publications/proceedingsKoliCalling2006/research2.pdf
>
>
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