new to raspberry pi - ages of users

[mariannetalbot]

Hi everyone,

Have only just learned about Raspberry Pi. Not terribly technical myself. But would very much like various nieces, nephews and Godchildren to be. What age group is the Raspberry Pi computer aimed at?

Marianne

[DeeJay]

The original target for the RPi was (secondary) school age children coming up to University entrance.

As things have turned out the users now range from something like 8 to 80, with occasional individuals beyond even that spread.

But it isn't a 'magic bullet' to technical understanding. Actual ages and competences obviously vary, but I think it is unlikely that anyone under (approx) 12 or 13 will accomplish much without adult guidance and encouragement.

[mariannetalbot]

Oh that's a shame, all my greatnieces and nephews and Godchildren are under ten. Wouldn't it be a good idea to get them early?

Anyway, thank you for your rep[ly.

Marianne

[DougieLawson]

Have only just learned about Raspberry Pi. Not terribly technical myself. But would very much like various nieces, nephews and Godchildren to be. What age group is the Raspberry Pi computer aimed at?

Personal computers have never been age related. When me and my twin brother started playing with them in the early 1980s my mother joined in (mostly as an end user). Her excuse was that she wanted to keep up with what we were doing.

My father who'd been in banking since the time when they wrote things up in ledgers with red and black ink (using a quill pen ) and through the introduction of computers into banking branches has never been interested in the rotten things (I get a couple of emails a year from him).

So as DeeJay says: eight to eighty. I'd extend that from six to a hundred. With something like Scratch (a visual programming system) you may be able to take the entry age even lower.

We do have to draw a distinction between users and hackers. Everyone who has a tablet or smart phone is using a computer every five minutes of the day.

[DeeJay]

Oh that's a shame, all my greatnieces and nephews and Godchildren are under ten. Wouldn't it be a good idea to get them early?

I agree. I don't see how you can think my reply is at odds with that.

If you wanted to encourage them to be musical, would you buy them flutes, violins, guitars etc, hand them over and say "there you are, make music... ?"

[boyoh]

The Pi was designed to learn programming and electronics
Ten year olds I think might learn the programming ok,
But will struggle with the electronics, as the learning
Will entail building circuits on a bread board ,
Remember the Raspberry Pi is us less with out
Something to programme such as electronics
Projects.

[meltwater]

The age it self does not matter it simply depends on how much support they have to do it.

I've use the Raspberry Pi with a 5 year old without problems, but she needed a lot of help and guidance to see what it was all about. It helps if they are able to read, but being interested and wanting to listen can be enough, particularly with programming with scratch since they can then start to understand and form their own ideas of how things slot together.

Regarding electronics, again, with help you can do this at a young age, Fritzing is excellent for this since you can draw out the circuit and create a visual breadboard image which they can then put together on their own. Just check it out before you plug it in, and away you go.

Needless to say, when that LED starts binking on their own circuit...well they are so proud of it!

The best tip I can give, is ask them what they want to do, give them options and let them make the choices. If they want to do something you are not sure of, come back to it another day (when you have tested how to do it...).

The age for doing stuff independently is difficult, I know plenty of adults who can't do that yet so it would have to depend on the child, and the resources you supply them with to do it. Given a decent book, and someone they can ask for help, kids from the age of 10 or so would probably cope well with following through various examples and then go on to tinker and change things as they wish.

[boyoh]

The age it self does not matter it simply depends on how much support they have to do it.

I've use the Raspberry Pi with a 5 year old without problems, but she needed a lot of help and guidance to see what it was all about. It helps if they are able to read, but being interested and wanting to listen can be enough, particularly with programming with scratch since they can then start to understand and form their own ideas of how things slot together.

Regarding electronics, again, with help you can do this at a young age, Fritzing is excellent for this since you can draw out the circuit and create a visual breadboard image which they can then put together on their own. Just check it out before you plug it in, and away you go.

Needless to say, when that LED starts binking on their own circuit...well they are so proud of it!

The best tip I can give, is ask them what they want to do, give them options and let them make the choices. If they want to do something you are not sure of, come back to it another day (when you have tested how to do it...).

The age for doing stuff independently is difficult, I know plenty of adults who can't do that yet so it would have to depend on the child, and the resources you supply them with to do it. Given a decent book, and someone they can ask for help, kids from the age of 10 or so would probably cope well with following through various examples and then go on to tinker and change things as they wish.

But you have got to understand, a lot of
Young Pi enthusiast don't have a experienced
Grown ups sat besides them giving help and guidance,
That's whey they relied on the Forum,
It is not until they are older that thy come in Contact with IT at school

BoyOh

[meltwater]

But you have got to understand, a lot of
Young Pi enthusiast don't have a experienced
Grown ups sat besides them giving help and guidance,
That's whey they relied on the Forum,
It is not until they are older that thy come in Contact with IT at school

BoyOh

Totally, and I would say that IT at school probably doesn't give them much of a head start with using something like the Raspberry Pi either.

It is not at the stage where a kid could pick it up and start using it on their own [YET].

The Kano system does seem to address this, although unfortunately that does come at a price (unfortunately I say because it'll be kids who will need it brought for them - but such things cost because they require a lot of work to create).

Also there are more and more books which will close the gap too. It takes a long time for all this to come to the surface, but it is getting there slowly.

[kasisnu]

A good instrument to push the lower limit on age is the Makey Makey. I have a four year old cousin who loves it, and this is important!

It's not as sophisticated as a Pi, but it's fun and using it is extremely simple. You can easily hook it up with scratch and you have kids designing games with augmented game controllers.

You can check out some of the projects built with them here. http://makeymakey.com/gallery/

[DougieLawson]

Take a look at http://themagpi.com there's loads of article for beginners (starting with stuff done in Scratch). I think the youngest author was 12 years old (he may have been younger) and wrote about the Fish Dish add-on board with Scratch.
http://www.themagpi.com/issue/issue-25/

[Richard-TX]

Age group? It depends on the intent of use. I use the Rpi as a small controller for a variety of tasks. As such I fall into the 30+ year old demographic group.

[liudr]

It is harder for girls than for boys. At the age of 12 you lose many girls to non-science or technology careers. Boys have some tendency to control stuff. I started as a school-age boy. I had an apple ][ clone, one manual, printed in real oil and on crappy folded A3 paper so it would appear to be double sided. Apple ][ was not raspberry pi you flip the switch and start typing BASIC. That was a major game changer for my next 2 to 3 decades. Although I am not a programmer by trade, I have a mind set as programmers do, solve problems programmatically. It is important for my career too. If we didn't have that apple, I would be a lot less inclined to write programs. I consider a manual very important, even if it is riddled with mistakes. I learned my basic by typing in the program samples in the book and modifying it. That was the late 80s, no internet for me until another decade. Gaming encouraged me to learn more about computer and programming. You wonder if pirating has and upside? Just see how many windows pc are out there. I wonder if we can make projects to incorporate raspberry pi with popular kids games. Use that and science fair and school projects to get kids more exposure.

After I learned BASIC, I tried hard to find any project where I can make use of my skills, nothing. Instead, I made transformers from the animated series (they all transform) and fixing bikes with my dad for a while until more opportunity presented to me, i.e. a PC. Again this is irrelevant now. Show them results from YouTube, see if they want to learn.