William Chops Westfield wrote:

> So what does one use for teaching basic programming to kids these days.
> (pre-algebraic 5th graders, to be specific.)  I haven't heard anything
> about LOGO in a long time, and Pascal seems a bit dated and uncommon.
> Java?  Are there any good java books and/or environments aimed at kids
> this age?
>
> BillW
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I guess you could have a look at Smalltalk, which was originally 
designed for just this purpose.  Its most readily accessible form is 
Squeak, and in particular at: http://squeakland.org/ which is dedicated 
to teaching children through computers.  Smalltalk was designed by Alan 
Kay, and developed in the Xerox labs. Squeak is a free implementation 
which includes an extensive set of capabilities including multimedia. 

To quote from the Squeakland:
"

Squeak is a "media authoring <http://squeakland.org/author/index.html> 
tool"-- software that you can download to your computer and then use to 
create your own media or share and play with others. It is free and 
downloadable here <http://squeakland.org/detect.html>. If you'd like to 
get a feel for what Squeak looks like without downloading, view a 
typical early project for kids in HTML 
<http://squeakland.org/school/drive_a_car/html/Drivecar12.html> (no 
download needed). Once you download Squeak you can use the Squeak 
Tutorials <http://squeakland.org/author/etoys.html> and download the 
handy Etoys Quickstart Guide 
<http://squeakland.org/author/startguide.html>.Further information can 
be found in the Squeak FAQ <http://squeakland.org/whatis/squeakfaq.html>.


David


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