Synopses & Reviews
Teach Your Kids to Code is a parent and teacher's guide to teaching basic programming and problem-solving skills. Together with your kids, you'll learn how to program in Python, the popular and powerful language that's used in college computer science courses and tech companies worldwide, like Google and IBM. But because it's easy to learn, Python makes a great first programming language for kids, too.
Filled with visual and game-oriented examples to hold a young programmer's attention, Teach Your Kids to Code has step-by-step explanations that will have kids learning computational thinking concepts in no time flat. You'll explore geometry using the Turtle module, learn Python's syntax, then build fun, playable games, like Yahtzee, War, and Pong.
With fun, friendly explanations of "complicated" programming concepts like loops, lists, functions, and variables, the book slowly ramps up to the point where you'll be able to make your own cool games and applications.
Teach Your Kids to Code is the perfect companion to an introductory programming class or your after school meet-up. Have a fun (and educational!) afternoon at the computer with your kids.
Synopsis
Teach Your Kids to Code is a parent's and teacher's guide to teaching kids basic programming and problem solving using Python, the powerful language used in college courses and by tech companies like Google and IBM.
Step-by-step explanations will have kids learning computational thinking right away, while visual and game-oriented examples hold their attention. Friendly introductions to fundamental programming concepts such as variables, loops, and functions will help even the youngest programmers build the skills they need to make their own cool games and applications.
Whether you've been coding for years or have never programmed anything at all, Teach Your Kids to Code will help you show your young programmer how to:
- Explore geometry by drawing colorful shapes with Turtle graphics
- Write programs to encode and decode messages, play Rock-Paper-Scissors, and calculate how tall someone is in Ping-Pong balls
- Create fun, playable games like War, Yahtzee, and Pong
- Add interactivity, animation, and sound to their apps
Teach Your Kids to Code is the perfect companion to any introductory programming class or after-school meet-up, or simply your educational efforts at home. Spend some fun, productive afternoons at the computer with your kids you can all learn something
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About the Author
Bryson Payne has a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Georgia State University and was the first Department Head of Computer Science at the University of North Georgia, where he has taught for over 15 years. He previously taught middle-school math and programming and continues to work extensively with K-12 schools to promote technology education.
Table of Contents
; Advance Praise for Teach Your Kids to Code; About the Author; About the Illustrator; About the Technical Reviewer; Acknowledgments; Introduction: What Is Coding and Why Is It Good for Your Kids?; Why Should Kids Learn to Code?; Where Can Kids Learn to Code?; How to Use This Book; Coding = Solving Problems; Chapter 1: Python Basics: Get to Know Your Environment; 1.1 Getting Started with Python; 1.2 Writing Programs in Python; 1.3 Running Programs in Python; 1.4 What You Learned; Chapter 2: Turtle Graphics: Drawing with Python; 2.1 Our First Turtle Program; 2.2 Turtle on a Roll; 2.3 Turtle Roundup; 2.4 Adding a Touch of Color; 2.5 One Variable to Rule Them All; 2.6 What You Learned; Chapter 3: Numbers and Variables: Python Does the Math; 3.1 Variables: Where We Keep Our Stuff; 3.2 Numbers and Math in Python; 3.3 Strings: The Real Characters in Python; 3.4 Improving Our Color Spiral With Strings; 3.5 Lists: Keeping It All Together; 3.6 Python Does Your Homework; 3.7 What You Learned; Chapter 4: Loops Are Fun (You Can Say That Again); 4.1 Rosette.py; 4.2 Building Your Own for Loops; 4.3 Improving Our Rosette Program with User Input; 4.4 Game Loops and while Loops; 4.5 The Family Spiral; 4.6 Putting It All Together: Spiral Goes Viral; 4.7 What You Learned; Chapter 5: Conditions (What If?); 5.1 If Statements; 5.2 Meet the Booleans; 5.3 Else Statements; 5.4 Elif Statements; 5.5 Complex Conditions: If, and, or, not; 5.6 Secret Messages; 5.7 What You Learned; Chapter 6: Random Fun and Games: Go Ahead, Take a Chance!; 6.1 A Guessing Game; 6.2 Colorful Random Spirals; 6.3 Rock-Paper-Scissors; 6.4 Pick a Card, Any Card; 6.5 Roll the Dice: Creating a Yahtzee-Style Game; 6.6 Kaleidoscope; 6.7 What You Learned; Chapter 7: Functions: There's a Name for That; 7.1 Putting Things Together with Functions; 7.2 Parameters: Feeding Your Function; 7.3 Return: It's What You Give Back That Counts; 7.4 A Touch of Interaction; 7.5 ClickKaleidoscope; 7.6 What You Learned; Chapter 8: Timers and Animation: What Would Disney Do?; 8.1 Getting All GUI with Pygame; 8.2 Timing It Just Right: Move and Bounce; 8.3 What You Learned; Chapter 9: User Interaction: Get into the Game; 9.1 Adding Interaction: Click and Drag; 9.2 Advanced Interaction: Smiley Explosion; 9.3 SmileyPop, Version 1.0; 9.4 What You Learned; Chapter 10: Game Programming: Coding for Fun; 10.1 Building a Game Skeleton: Smiley Pong, Version 1.0; 10.2 Adding Difficulty and Ending the Game: Smiley Pong, Version 2.0; 10.3 Adding More Features: SmileyPop V2.0; 10.4 What You Learned; Python Setup for Windows, Mac, and Linux; Python for Windows; Python for Mac; Python for Linux; Pygame Setup for Windows, Mac, and Linux; Pygame for Windows; Pygame for Mac; Pygame for Linux; Building Your Own Modules; Building the colorspiral Module; Additional Resources; Glossary; Updates;