[Edu-sig] Re: easy for beginners, even children

[Daniel Ajoy]

On 12 Apr 2004 at 9:06, David Handy wrote:

> Yeah, Logo was designed for teaching. I'm still not motivated to use it 
> for teaching my beginners.
> 
> I think this syntax
> 
>    make "myarray {one two three}
> 
> is more confusing for beginners than
> 
>    myarray = ['one', 'two', 'three']

It could be, but won't they get confused when
they learn about "==" vs "=". In Logo the 
difference is more explicit:

how do you have to write this in Python:

make "a 10
if :a = 10 [make "a 20]

Besides:

In Logo:

? show 2 = 3
false

In Python:

>>> 2 = 3
SyntaxError: can't assign to literal


> I wish someone would do a controlled study of Logo and Python as first
> programming languages. It would be interesting to see which approach was
> more successful in helping people get started actually programming, as
> opposed to having a one-time experience and never touching it again.

I haven't learned Python yet because it seems something too big to learn 
now. I'm more comfortable with small languages: bash, awk, logo

> Logo has been around longer than Python and it's the most well-known
> programming language. It's had plenty of time to prove itself. But I've
> not yet met anyone who said "yeah, Logo was great, after learning it I
> went on to..." write a game, do a project on their own, or anything.

Here are some:

http://developers.slashdot.org/developers/02/09/19/0548211.shtml?tid=146

cheers,
Daniel