Need Help Teaching Programming Class

[MTROB]

I have been asked to teach one class per grade at my school as part of hour of code. For the younger classes I will be using Code.org and their hour of code resources. However I am struggling with the older grades. Some of the students in the older grades already know how to code, and the teacher has already given a introductory class to on programming, not in terms of syntax, but structure. So I was wondering how I can make the class interesting and appeal to all the kids even if they already know how to program. I was planning on using Codecademy to teach Python, that way they can continue on after the class is over if they wish. However is there a better resource, or way to teach, that will appeal to students of all levels? I learned Python using Learn Python the Hard Way and am learning C the same way. I don't believe that will work as is a little bit harder to see the outcome of your work compared to Codecademy, for example you have to use a Command Line program to see the results of your program, compared to in your browser. Any input would be greatly appreciated.

[KingDaddyDaniel]

Sex Euphemisms

Seriously, put tons of euphemistic comments describing the structure of example code.

The little shits children will pay attention and the ones that are actually interested will be comfor-tyzed into asking questions

[Enderman]

Python is great.

Always use python

[madknight3]

Not really sure what you're supposed to cover in the hour of code lesson, but if possible, I would try to do up examples they can relate to. Maybe you can pick pieces of functionality from things like Snapchat, Twitter, Facebook, etc that you can mimic on a basic level.

 

It'll be better if they can see something visual, so even if you don't teach them basic GUI programming, you might still be able to utilize it in your examples. Just keep the GUI code separate from what you show them to avoid confusion.

[branfrd]

Teach them OpenGL, that's fun and challenging. Prob best to do it in python though. And if you do, use the Pyglet libraries. I personally think that the best way to teach basic OpenGL, and also the basics to Game Engines, is to make a simplified version of Minecraft in python.