school grades, as maria montessori put it, are "small minded blackmail attempts".
kids don't learn because of good grades. primariy they seek justice.
while a teacher can prefer a busy but unintelligent school girl, a computer won't do that.
when coding, your result can basically only be a working prog or not.
no teacher required to tell you if your prog is working.
you get your reward from the computer: joy of creating something.
psychologically seen, to learn that what you are doing creates impact is the very basis of learning.
if you give your child Mastery, Autonomy and Purpose
* some tools and an environment to start with
* freedom to try and fail without waiting for a teacher to answer questions and
* a good reason to learn,
after a very short time you will see someone who does not need "extrinsic motivation" and explanations. be prepared for more questions than you can answer.
maybe, the garbage man will still be the garbage man in the end. but possibly see ways to improve his work or at least look forward to his side projects after work.
maybe this is just an outlier experience, but I deny that teaching (like telling somebody how to do something) is a successful approach at all.
a widely underestimated ressource is that the learner wants to learn it. so, the best you can do is to show your owh profit from programming. then wait for questions.
and I mean wait.
I have seen intelligent parents push their kids and really getting them annoyed and thus unwilling to learn stuff.
very good for questions you can not answer yourself is
https://zen.coderdojo.com/find
here, kids can (but don't have to) work on their own projects, ask highly qualified experts and -- even more importantly -- watch other kids working on their projects.
plus: I have seen 6 year old kids presenting their project to 150 people at the coderdojo without even realizing what skill they acquired.
it boils down to 3 aspects:
Mastery, Autonomy and Purpose
from my "teaching experience" with adults, giving the responsability to the learner is the important part.
I hold seminars starting with an empty document. then I ask people to ask questions, otherwise the seminar would be over within the next 10 minutes. people instantly wake up and start to take responsability.
I partnered with a much larger company to profit from an existing sales structure and their technical infrastucture. To me it seems like -- due to their size -- they wanted to cut a larger piece of the cake for themselves, so negotiations about the details didn't really come to an end. They started to create and sell the product on their own with lots of stolen concept details. I am glad they failed.
My lesson is to bootstrap and implement fast. Don't worry if sales are not exploding. However, check if sales are pointing upwards and finance is under control.
(due to horrible layout and inability to edit, here is the list again, second attempt)
here is a incomplete list of my findings:
soft skills list:
* don't push;
* accept if they are not (yet) interested;
* support emotionally ;
* trust your kids;
be patient even if it looks like bullshit;
even if you know the solution, wait for the question;
tools:
* coderdojo;
* guest net;
* don't try to create a website whitelist;
* buy / borrow hardware they like to try out;
misc:
* watch spin offs;
some remarks might need explanation.
don't push:
if you do, any kind of motivation will turn to become the opposite.
support emotionally:
one of the differences between adults and kids in terms of learning is how to deal with ambition. kids might start to cry or get aggressive when things don't work the way they planned. dealing with ambition is part of the learning process.
the best answer for your kid might be non-technical, just hugging.
even if you know the solution, wait for the question:
you can only learn when it feels like you have control on how to do it. if it's not yet time for the answer, there is no problem and no learning motivation.
coderdojo:
look it up and discover how kids learn programming. best to wait for your child to discover projects of other kids.
guest net:
separate your internet from your kid's internet. the risk of viruses or exploits caught from discovery journeys on the internet is extremely decreased.
don't try to create a website whitelist:
I tried to maintain a whitelist of allowed websites and waited for requests to come. after less than a week I gave up. same is true for search platforms or websites designed for children. trusting your kid looks like the better choice to me.
buy / borrow hardware kids like to try out:
we are buying heaps of hardware (raspberry pi / arduino / camera / smartphone), most of which financed out of our child's pocket money. his decision.
spin offs:
spin offs are the most interesting discovery to me.
my kid writes short stories to be integrated into his self created apps, so he can share them with other kids.
math is easy if it is related to solving computer problems (compared to torture if the only reason is memorizing unrelated stuff)
yes! the most important lesson from neurostudies and psychology is usually ignored: you can only learn when [feel like] you have control over how to do it. learning simply does not work when you push it. pushing will kill motivation.
I usually only need to get obstacles out of the way and answer questions (if I can). the rest comes from sheer interest from my child. scratch was interesting for just a couple of weeks, now it is java script, raspberry pi / linux, arduino, smartphone app programming using appinventor or any scripting language.
the issue is not programming language, the driving question is "what machine do I want to build".
you might want to check out "coderdojo" at a place near you. usually other kids are better teachers to your kid than you are.
your best instrument to teach tech is to wait and take your kid's questions seriously. patience pays.
what age am I talking about? my child wrote programs and apps long before he was able to read or write. pushing as a motivation killer also applies to adults. so I guess, this "advice" is universal.
no teacher required to tell you if your prog is working. you get your reward from the computer: joy of creating something.
psychologically seen, to learn that what you are doing creates impact is the very basis of learning.
if you give your child Mastery, Autonomy and Purpose * some tools and an environment to start with * freedom to try and fail without waiting for a teacher to answer questions and * a good reason to learn, after a very short time you will see someone who does not need "extrinsic motivation" and explanations. be prepared for more questions than you can answer.
maybe, the garbage man will still be the garbage man in the end. but possibly see ways to improve his work or at least look forward to his side projects after work.