[conservatism_IS_compassion]

On reflection I am put in mind of the 1980 era LOGO language, with its turtle control commands.
LOGO allowed a learner to command the cursor, called (but not really illustrated as) the “turtle,” to move and turn.

Swift is a radically more powerful language than LOGO, and it runs on a radically more powerful processor. And its gyro and accelerometer inputs add an entirely different dimension. Swift is far more than strictly educational.

Swift Playground will be available this fall in the App Store, free. I myself might avail myself of it, and homeschoolers who want their charges to learn a programming language probably could do a lot worse, a lot more expensively (assuming they already have a suitable iPad). To go by the demo, it looks like kids might find it fun.

[sagar]

All kids should be taught actual computer programming, not sexting, if America is to realistically avoid importing foreigners and replace dead end jobs that are happening within a decade.

[proxy_user]

He pointed out that SWIFT:

Only works on Apple computers!

[FredZarguna]

A genuinely ridiculous idea. To teach kids a programming language when they can’t even manage the basic rules of algebra — on a single platform, essentially proprietary language no less — is exactly the kind of horseradish education is to love to use to distract parents and taxpayers from their spectacular failures.

[Zirondelle]

I teach MIT Scratch and Scratch Jr. No need for Swift.

[catnipman]

Hey, good for Tim. But if they can’t even teach reading, writing and arithmetic, how the hell are they gonna teach computer programming?

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

Swift Playgrounds(Apple link)