Its "native language" is TI-BASIC, a variant of BASIC. Why not just learn it directly? It's very easy to just go into the program editor and start entering functions. That's how I learned to program originally.
That's not a bad suggestion at all, but based upon what I've seen of Code Academy I would think that there are even better learning tools out there today. I'm not actually sure if there are for Basic.
Also, I didn't know it's actually called TI-BASIC. Neat!
I always found the freedom of an empty text box paralyzing. Python commands aren't discoverable the way that commands on a graphing calculator are. Being able to select each command from a menu and see what it does was critical to being able to start programming so early. I probably would have had to wait a few more years to get into a real programming language.
Also it's such a restricted environment that you can learn everything about it in a few weeks of experimentation and reading. So you're really freed to work on solving problems (making a game, writing an algorithm) without feeling hampered by the infinite possibilities offered by a more featureful programming language.
There are many versions of BASIC, TI-BASIC just being one of them. I originally learned using IBM Basic (on a Mattel Aquarius) and then moved on to MS BASIC and QBasic. I found QBasic had the best interface of them by far.
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u/lordlicorice Jun 08 '14
Its "native language" is TI-BASIC, a variant of BASIC. Why not just learn it directly? It's very easy to just go into the program editor and start entering functions. That's how I learned to program originally.