HP48 - Children 'Games' Educational Code recommendations

[TomC]

Please share any successful experiences with available (on the Calc/Museum sites) programs for a child 3 to 6 years old - to run on an HP48G.

It's most interesting to see how a child can be entertained by just watching numbers count and/or scroll by - Games/educational stuff like flash cards (large numbers), 'Worms' would be entertaining.

I know there's a lot of code out there - just hoping to get opinions on positive experiences.
(preferably user code so I could easily mod if necessary).

Thanks,
TomC

[burkhard]

(12-09-2018 06:46 PM)TomC Wrote:  Please share any successful experiences with available (on the Calc/Museum sites) programs for a child 3 to 6 years old - to run on an HP48G.

It's most interesting to see how a child can be entertained by just watching numbers count and/or scroll by - Games/educational stuff like flash cards (large numbers), 'Worms' would be entertaining.

I know there's a lot of code out there - just hoping to get opinions on positive experiences.
(preferably user code so I could easily mod if necessary).

Thanks,
TomC

Nobody replied, so I'll just offer a personal opinion as somebody with four kids of my own:
I would be careful.

Once you give a kid of that age electronics (yes, even a monochrome 30-year old calculator!), it is hard to amuse them with anything else except more electronics. Many people sorely regret letting the genie out of the bottle with children at such a young age; it is hard to get it back in.

Kids in that age range should be (again..my opinion here) be aligned to amuse themselves with books and learning to read and do things than involve writing dexterity skills of using a real pen/pencil/crayon to draw, color, and do puzzles. Old fashioned board games are great as well. The more varied other "media options" we give them, the more apt books and writing will be never touched.

Left to their own will, kids naturally will gravitate to easy passive choices involving screens and things that flash and make noise. When you set them off on that path, their "need" for a lot of stimulation keeps growing... it's like crack. If you doubt this, just compare a fairly sedate Sesame Street episode from the early 1970s with one of today. The modern version is very hyper and "amped-up" in order to keep the interest of (most) modern children. When my children were small, I turned it on once or twice and almost suffered a seizure. Never again.

I believe proficient literacy is really "job one" for parents of kids at that age. My 6th grader has only started to use a calculator a little in the past year or so. Kids won't be hurt by delaying their foray into electronic gadgets. Once it's unleashed to older kids (or better, carefully metered out), they get up to speed astonishingly quickly.

Obviously everybody's experiences vary. i'm sure lots of success stories as well, but until the child reads well and eagerly, I would be very cautious.

[TomC]

THank you.