Re: Debian for kids (long)
On Wed, 9 Feb 2000, Ben Armstrong wrote:
> My children are younger, and C, I think, is largely beyond them. As a
> child, my own father taught me Pascal first. But I realize that C has
> long since superceded Pascal as a "first" language to teach at the
> university level. Today, Java is gaining in popularity. All of this
> motion from one beginning language to the next is as much motivated by
> political and business concerns as it is by practical concerns. I'm
> left confused now about what language would be "best" to introduce to
> my kids first. At one time in my life I would have said "Logo" without
> hesitation. I guess I'll have to look closely at what SEUL-EDU has
> undoubtedly already discussed on this topic.
OK, I think it makes less sense to discuss which programming language is
best for learning in general. Kids are different and so they might
tend to different languages. My decision was to try C because I can
*teach* this best, just because I'm very familiar with it.
> Ah, the english version is "Battleship".
Thanks. Is there any clone around, yet? If not it will be if I
manage to teach my boy right ;-).
> When chosing a simple beginning
> project for me in Pascal, my father chose Conway's game of life. I fondly
> recall watching the teletype terminal at the university rattle off
> generation after generation produced from my code. :)
Of course, one of the first programs to write for everyone :).
> The Reader Rabbit series educational games were gifts from grandparents.
> They are treasured games by both the kids and ourselves.
In the last few years I wrote E-Mails to some companies to think about
porting their software to linux.
I did so at:
1) National instruments for LabWindows.
I didn't got any answer but they answered with a Linux version
since last year.
2) Stupfl (controling software for slide shows - its my hobby to
do some nature photography, if interested see
http://www.physik.uni-halle.de/~e2od5/island/index_eng.html or
http://www.physik.uni-halle.de/~e2od5/natur)
They showed technical interest but no realisation in the near
future.
3) Douglas Adams company which wrote the Game "Starship titanic"
(adventure game according to Douglas Adams last book)
They answered politely that they don't have enough manpower and
will start the next project ("Hitchhikers Guide" ;-) ).
I would really like to play the game which deals with one of
my favourite books, but that's no reason to install Win in my
opinion.
I think if everybody of us would try to ask politely (!) the company of
his most wanted program to be ported to Linux once or twice a year we
could at least awake more interest than we wouldn't do that.
> Yup. Maybe this weekend I'll find the time to get some help with setting
> up an area for debian-kids on the www.debian.org site and a mailing list
> as well. This list will be one of the first, and easiest resources to get
> started on that site.
That would be nice.
Just for curiosity: Yesterday my son said that he prefers Linux over
its Win (3.1) because I can immediately start to type in what he wants
instead of moving the mouse around and click on images which needs
so long to start up ...
Kind regards
Andreas.
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