Ask HN: How to teach someone programming?

by nnd on 7/22/2016, 11:55 PM with 2 comments

I'd like to mentor a friend to learn programming. She tried some bootcamps but they weren't very successful for her.

I'm thinking the best way would be rather than teaching frameworks and algorithms, to actually pick a project and build something and learn as you go. I'm leaning towards something with instant gratification, like an iPhone app or a video game.

Any other ideas?

  • by Isammoc on 7/23/2016, 2:42 PM

    In my own experience, bootcamps or other made up stages are about to fail because of the fact they have prerequisites that are not shown.

    For your friend (and you), I will recommend to start with basic knowledge. What is Boole's logic? What is a microship? How to control a microship.

    An example will be : http://www.nand2tetris.org/

    Begin with a (only one) project will fall in some pitfalls: - do not cover basic principles - assume to know a framework, or to use bad practices - do not teach programming, but a language for only one purpose

    (sorry for my bad english)

  • by hepidad on 7/23/2016, 5:54 PM

    Just introduce him/her freecodecamp.com