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[pilgrimboy]

Okay, my eleven year old wants to start dabbling in programming. What's a good starting place? Where to go to learn?

[Tarqiup Inua]

Okay, my eleven year old wants to start dabbling in programming. What's a good starting place? Where to go to learn?

Well, guess I'll give you my two cents worth of advice. There is an old learning programming language called Pascal which doesn't let the beginners do anything too wrong. It's not a bad place to start. In languages like C you can frequently encounter trouble by unknowingly using some unusual technique and the compiler (program, that translates your code into programs - more or less) won't bother telling you.

Pascal is nice because it tells you every time (and doesn't allow you as much, but that hardly matters if you are still learning).

I am not sure how much harder can it be for beginner to start learning C, Java is supposedly pretty beginner friendly...

[Dutchling]

Raspberry Pi? Have no experience with it, but heard good thing about it.

[pilgrimboy]

Thanks.

[Dutchling]

I have followed a python tutorial http://interactivepython.org/courselib/static/thinkcspy/index.html myself actually. Was quite easy to follow, with assignments you can make on that webpage.

[Lectorog]

If you'd rather start the hard way first, this is perhaps the easiest way to do it:
http://www.learncpp.com/
Good C++ tutorial.

I've heard RogueBasin has a good tutorial to go right into roguelike creation, but consequently not as much general programming is learned about.
Does the child want to learn about programming, or does it want to make games?

[Aseaheru]

if you have minecraft and you get redpower that has BASIC on there.

[LoSboccacc]

I started at that age by coding additional levels for nibbles in qbasic.

the rule for a level are pretty easy and yet it is interesting when it comes to generating shape more complex than a square with some hole on borders.

[Lectorog]

Poking around and modifying the DF raw files could be a good introduction.

[lordcooper]

Start them on C++.

Seriously, they'll thank you in years to come.

[Levi]

I've heard good things about Code Academy:  http://www.codecademy.com/#!/exercises/0

Its even got different language courses: http://www.codecademy.com/learn

[LoSboccacc]

At 11yo starting with c++ will just scare him away

Specially if they didn't prepare his mental curiosity and theoretical planning ability appropriately.

There is just too much superstructure to know before r even dabbling in it.

[Max White]

Recommending c, c++ and Pascal is like recommending learning to ride a bike without the training wheels because 'they will thank you for it later'
These people are only looking at the technical aspects involved, insisting that learning how memory management works at a young age will in some way help. Bullshit. At this young age, most require some sort of higher level language that handles the tedious, technical aspects for them so that they can learn what programming is about.

A computer is to a programmer what a scalpel is to a surgeon. It is but a single tool that is often implemented, but not the core focus of their study. While a surgeon is an expert on anatomy, a programmer is an expert on logic flow. As such, you need to start, as this tender young age, with a programming language that does away with these artifacts produced by having to work with a computer, and focuses on the basics of control structures and logical thinking. They will thank you for it later.

Working with the .net framework, the two I can think off are VisualBasic and SmallBasic, but there are others. Raspberrypi might also be good.

The point is that knowing your iteration, repetition and selection is more important than banging your head against a wall of pointers.

[Heron TSG]

This is how I started at the age of 13: Graphing calculator. TI graphing calculators come with TI-BASIC installed, and it's easy. It's also impossible to screw up. I made a random D&D character generator, a quadratic formula calculator, a number guessing game, all sorts of things.

[eerr]

Compile something which outputs catcatcatcatcat infinitely to std out.

Make him display the output.

True basic is nice, though you will have to baby him.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Game maker makes platformers a bit hard to make.

Codeacademy is the worst intro ever:
It doesn't teach anything at all. You just get to spend hours drilling through code that should have 60 second explanations.