I and my 10 y.o. son have much fun with Scratch, yet it's time to add some non-visual language, I think.
I could think of python, java-script, java, may be C#, yet I have no real idea where to move to. I am personally C++ programmer and have no much experience with these languages. And I do not want yet to teach my son C++.

One of the problems - after playing with Scratch, my son is very used to have a sprite-style graphics (as well as pixel graphics) and I'd like to have something of the same sort for him with a language he will learn. Actually, I cannot think about other types of projects for him as doing math calculations just for their own sake is too early for him and making some algorithms with textual i/o must probably be boring. In fact, my own early experience was with Basic where I could have easy access to pixel graphics and even some primitive sprites.

I tried Python meanwhile - just to find that it probably does not have a standard library which could provide graphic features parallel to Scratch graphics, so I'll need to look for various Python third-party libraries to see if there is a match.

And… at this point I wanted to ask the community - do you have any ideas and recommendations?
I am actually not asking for much - just a mainstream language in which there is a standard or a well-supported library of pixel graphics and sprites.
Or may be you have an idea how to make programming fun without sprites and graphics for 10 y.o. ?

BTW, if we could only have some descent script language (may be java-script) to program Scratch…

Thank you!
F.

you should try tosh, of course

tosh.tjvr.org

Edit: or have a look at you-win! It’s a Scratch-like JavaScript library I wrote, for roughly this purpose :-)

^ Tosh is just an alternate interface to Scratch.

If you use JavaScript, your son can use the Canvas API to create graphics. The WebGL interface is extremely complex, but the CanvasRenderingContext2D API is very simple. Python's Turtle graphics library is also an option.

TheAspiringHacker wrote:

Python's Turtle graphics library is also an option.

Hmm… can I use Turtle to have moving sprites, to write a game?

Fiber312 wrote:

TheAspiringHacker wrote:

Python's Turtle graphics library is also an option.

Hmm… can I use Turtle to have moving sprites, to write a game?

Turtle graphics provides functionality similar to Scratch's pen. I checked, and it does have a turtle sprite. You can see some examples at https://github.com/python/cpython/tree/master/Lib/turtledemo if you want to get a sense of how ideas are implemented in the library.

Scheme. (edit: although, i'm not sure how great scheme is for graphics programming. guile-cairo exists, but is not exactly user friendly :<)

I've used javascript to make fun and simple games. Canvas is a little tricky to set up but once you see how it works it is super fun (a library that does sprites and stuff in js is pixi.js, it is pretty hard to use though)

Hey there! just to let you know my Dad was the one that introduced me to programming. He got me a book on Python to begin with. Python was a great language to learn when I was just starting off. In the long run the type system hindered me when I started to learn languages like C or C++

If you can teach your son a statically typed language he'll understand the luxury that is Python's type system. One language in particular I'd recommend would be Java. Mostly because of the large ecosystem and support for graphics libraries.

TheUltimatum wrote:

Hey there! just to let you know my Dad was the one that introduced me to programming. He got me a book on Python to begin with. Python was a great language to learn when I was just starting off. In the long run the type system hindered me when I started to learn languages like C or C++

If you can teach your son a statically typed language he'll understand the luxury that is Python's type system. One language in particular I'd recommend would be Java. Mostly because of the large ecosystem and support for graphics libraries.

Static typing is a luxury. Python's dynamic typing is a wart.

Fite me.

QB64 is aimed at beginners in programming and is a great beginning language for all.
It is very similar to Scratch whereas you can just use an image or something of the sorts and play around with it.
You can find it here

TheAspiringHacker wrote:

TheUltimatum wrote:

Hey there! just to let you know my Dad was the one that introduced me to programming. He got me a book on Python to begin with. Python was a great language to learn when I was just starting off. In the long run the type system hindered me when I started to learn languages like C or C++

If you can teach your son a statically typed language he'll understand the luxury that is Python's type system. One language in particular I'd recommend would be Java. Mostly because of the large ecosystem and support for graphics libraries.

Static typing + type inference is a luxury. Python's dynamic typing is a wart.

Fite me.

FIFY

Processing is a really good, simple language for writing graphical programs in. It also has a Python mode if Java syntax isn't your cup of tea.

BookOwl wrote:

Processing is a really good, simple language for writing graphical programs in. It also has a Python mode if Java syntax isn't your cup of tea.

There's also a version called p5.js that you can use in a browser, I started using it when I was about 12 and it's very easy to learn because there is a lot of example code and guides about how all the commands work.
My dad is also learning App Inventor, it's very similar to Scratch but you can run your code on an Android phone or tablet.

nickeljorn wrote:

BookOwl wrote:

Processing is a really good, simple language for writing graphical programs in. It also has a Python mode if Java syntax isn't your cup of tea.

There's also a version called p5.js that you can use in a browser, I started using it when I was about 12 and it's very easy to learn because there is a lot of example code and guides about how all the commands work.
My dad is also learning App Inventor, it's very similar to Scratch but you can run your code on an Android phone or tablet.

I really like p5.js it introduced me to javascript

The people above me are saying Processing is a good start…
QB64 has a Processing port/library that you can easily get off github

You can see many other QB64 libraries all contained here on their main forum
It also supports using C/C++ header files so you can use a wide assortment of libraries
(QB64 is very good if you want to start teaching your kid systems programming languages later on such as Rust, C/C++, R, D, etc.)

TheAspiringHacker wrote:

TheUltimatum wrote:

Hey there! just to let you know my Dad was the one that introduced me to programming. He got me a book on Python to begin with. Python was a great language to learn when I was just starting off. In the long run the type system hindered me when I started to learn languages like C or C++

If you can teach your son a statically typed language he'll understand the luxury that is Python's type system. One language in particular I'd recommend would be Java. Mostly because of the large ecosystem and support for graphics libraries.

Static typing is a luxury. Python's dynamic typing is a wart.

Fite me.

I find that I don't have to think very much about what I'm writing when I use python. I prefer to use it when I'm writing a quick hack or to get something done. I'd prefer not to argue with you about this. It's my opinion; you can't change that yourself, only I can.

Wettining wrote:

The people above me are saying Processing is a good start…
QB64 has a Processing port/library that you can easily get off github

You can see many other QB64 libraries all contained here on their main forum
It also supports using C/C++ header files so you can use a wide assortment of libraries
(QB64 is very good if you want to start teaching your kid systems programming languages later on such as Rust, C/C++, R, D, etc.)

I'd have to agree with you. QB64 is a great language to learn text based programming.

1 scratch

FOR OTHERS PYCHARM NEEDED
—————-
2 python
3 HTML
4 CSS
5 js (javascript)



that's how i learn programming laguages
i recomend python to learn next…
then by the way you can learn HTML, CSS and js (javascript)

if <(length of [ generic platformers] :: list) > [1000000]> then
set [ left scratch] to [true]
end

You Should Try Snap!, Snap! is Like Scratch, But with More Blocks, Like:

<is [turbo mode v] on?> :: sensing :: boolean

inherit [ v] :: variables

and Many, Many more!
Snap! Also Has First-Class Lists, Which May be Important to Some Users.
Online Editor
Download
Bye! =^..^=