[dbpokorny]

What are your thoughts on scheme vs. python for teaching programming grades 4-8? UC Berkeley switched from SICP to (SICP - Scheme + Python) and I love both scheme and python but haven't the foggiest idea which is actually better for the student. I grew up on Simply Scheme (by Brian Harvey and Matt Wright) and SICP. In the mid 90s, python wasn't available as an option for me. After using HyperTalk '92-'95, learning Scheme was enlightening, and it was my language of choice '96-'04. Then I found python in '04, which addressed the "thicket of incompatible implementations" problems Scheme had and provided more powerful data structures (list and dict) out of the box. Python code is easier on the eyes as well; the human eye is not designed to quickly differentiate six ")" in a row from five ")" in a row.

The added syntactic readability of python comes at the cost of increased complexity of the parser, complicating the design of the meta-circular interpreter (SICP ch. 4).

The added power of the built-in data structures (list and dict) comes at the cost of increased complexity of the implementation of the built-in library, complicating the design of the explicit control evaluator (SICP ch. 5).

What are your thoughts? Is there any hope of adapting the ideas of SICP for 4th-8th graders?