[philipov]

I learned my first programming language, Basic, when I was 8 years old, and reading code feels like a natural language to me. I think the complication is that programming involves both a language and a logic system. While language may be created naturally before puberty, having the requisite logical reasoning requires something extra. I had very early access to formal logic training, and this combined with self-motivated interest helped me overcome that barrier. I think it would be a deal breaker for others. It's one thing to be able to read a language, quite another to understand what it says.

Another factor is that the kind of language children are very good at learning is the spoken kind. Human capacity for reading and writing is not necessarily natural. You don't find many children learning Latin on their own without some other factor lowering the barrier for entry, either. Having a parent with whom to speak Latin would be that kind of factor.

[wallflower]

> I had very early access to formal logic training

Can you please expand on this? Montessori School?

[philipov]

No. I am simply lucky to have been born into a family of Russian Intelligentsia who could provide me with a real education.

In 1st grade, I enjoyed learning math too much, and the teacher found this disruptive, so the school found an excuse to get me classified as learning disabled and put me in special education where I spent all day isolated in a detached cottage with 2 teachers and no other students.

The teachers had no lesson plan or anything for me to do, so my mother bought logic puzzle books for me to play with to relieve the boredom. I had already gotten a strong foundation in reading from my family, so I enjoyed filling them out on my own. I also had plenty of educational video games to play at home that I greatly enjoyed. Learning to program was just another toy to play with.

Oklahoma education system at its finest!

[wallflower]

Thanks for the detail, it seems like you and your mother were able to "home school" yourself inside the school system.

[philipov]

Yep, precisely that.