I want to echo the suggestion that several others have made, to start with a good book on just about any programming language that has a lot of sample programs in it, and learn to read that code and execute it with pencil and paper.

This will be much more productive than trying to learn to write code from scratch while also learning a language and learning how to execute the code with pencil and paper.

I would start by going through the exercise yourself: pick out a book and use one of the first sample programs, and set up a "debugger" on a pad of paper.

I used to do this kind of debugging myself: when I first learned BASIC back around 1969, I spent some time in my grandmother's basement with two pads of paper, one with my code and one for the debugger. The debugger pad had columns across the top:

  Line number    One variable    Another variable    Another one

Then I would step through my code, adding a row on the debugger for each line I executed, with the current line number in the first column and each new variable value in the other columns.

After going through this exercise with one program, send your friend the "debugger" pad along with the book, so he has a place to start with this idea. He can then go through the same example and follow along with your debugging steps.

That way he has a solid place to start when exploring the other sample programs in the book.

Please feel free to email me if you'd like to kick this idea around - address is in my profile. And I strongly suspect that everyone else in this thread would be happy to extend you the same offer.

I also heartily endorse the suggestion to read Charles Petzold's _Code_. It's a wonderful book!