Hi all,

My 8 year old is asking if he can learn how to program.

I’d like to support this, and it seems like it’s not a transient interest as he’s been all over scratch, and using things like minecraft commands for the last year. I have an old (pre 2017) MacBook Air I can set up for this. How do I / what would you advise I set up for him, to a) keep him safe online (he’s 8!) and b) give him the tools he needs in a structured way.

  • nickwitha_k (he/him)
    link
    fedilink
    172 years ago

    I’m going to go a slightly different direction and suggest something that has physical feedback like Adafruit’s CircuitPlayground. It can be setup to use MakeCode, CircuitPython, or Arduino and there’s a lot of good resources, both for purchase, and free: https://www.adafruit.com/category/965