
How do you introduce someone to programming? - fz7412
I&#x27;m trying to introduce programming to my girlfriend, primarily because it will open much more career options for her. And I want to encourage more women to pursue a career in tech. I don&#x27;t want her to lose the interest after seeing the learning curve, or become overwhelmed and think it&#x27;s not meant for her.  Do you know of any books for engaging beginner&#x27;s interest in programming, showing them the beauty of it, giving them the highs without going into detail. 
Similar to the &quot;Mathematician&#x27;s lament&quot; by paul lockhart for mathematics and Feynman&#x27;s lectures for physics. Something that gives them that intial push, that gives them the &quot;feel&quot; of it, that motivation which lights that fire within? Do you suggest any other better way?
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musha68k
Hi there :)

I've had great success with teaching Javascript by being the go-to person to
talk about the very well written
[http://eloquentjavascript.net](http://eloquentjavascript.net) IMHO Javascript
is a great language to get enough bits of instant gratification to be
motivated to continue learning.

Merry xmas and have fun pairing :)

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fz7412
Thanks! I'm myself a javascript developer and was wondering if javascript
would be the best language to introduce programming.

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ruraljuror
I used How to Think Like a Computer Scientist[1] in conjunction with MIT's OCW
class for non-cs majors. I only did the assigned reading from the class, so I
didn't read it straight through, but I think it might be worth checking out.
That class is awesome. It is what I would recommend, but I was pretty
motivated.

[1]
[http://www.greenteapress.com/thinkpython/html/index.html](http://www.greenteapress.com/thinkpython/html/index.html)

[2] [http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/electrical-engineering-and-
comput...](http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/electrical-engineering-and-computer-
science/6-00sc-introduction-to-computer-science-and-programming-
spring-2011/Syllabus/)

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fz7412
Thanks! They seem interesting!

