Ask HN: Do you know any good coding platform for education? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Do you know any good coding platform for education?

17 pointssgorawski9 comments

Hi,

I want to teach a basic programming course (like, simple coding problems in Python). Do you know of any platform that’d allow me to create some challenges with some boilerplate code and then have students connect to from their browsers and solve them? I’m thinking about something like vscode.dev, but for the problem I described. I know about Replit’s “Teams for Education”, but I’ve seen some people complaining about it on HN [1], is it better now? Or is there something else?

Thanks!

[1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33268319

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My 12yo son is doing Strive Math [1], and loving it. They use p5.js running on Repl.it as the base layer, so there's zero set up time, and instant gratification. In the first or second class you're coding Pong-like games and doing other interesting visual puzzles and explorations. And it's mostly Python underneath (admittedly with tons of synthetic sugar on top), so you're not tied to the training wheels of a Scratch-like environment.

Strongly recommend to check them out. Their tutors are excellent, and fairly priced. And a lot of their work is open source, in case you want to leverage their libraries to build your own curriculum [2].

Another interesting option is PICO-8, the 8-bit virtual console. It has a nice editor, and uses Lua, which is also beginner-friendly. But I wanted something Python-based, and easier to extend beyond the pure educational environment, hence P5.js.

[1] https://www.strivemath.com/

[2] https://github.com/StriveMath

[3] https://www.lexaloffle.com/pico-8.php

My recommendation is to throw them towards the deep end of the pool a little…

Make them clone a Git repo, solve the problems, then submit their answers.

It’s much simpler for you, works offline, and they get to learn a tool that is basically indispensable!

There really isn’t a point to learning Python unless you situate your students in the world where they would actually benefit from knowing Python.

That is, it’s hard to teach woodworking without also teaching how to use a plane, chisel, router, et al.

Try python anywhere education. https://www.pythonanywhere.com/details/education

While not browser based, Thonny is designed speciffically for education https://thonny.org .

For beginners the main advantage is the easy install and maintainance, and the less intimidating/cluttered environment. I've seen it used successfully in remote teaching classes for absolute beginners working on their own machines.

IMHO it makes some decent tradeoffs, and it is an onramp for students evolving to VSCode or PyCharm when they feel ready.

If you have a Mac or (preferably) an iPad, check out the Swift Playgrounds app. All of the playgrounds and challenges that you see are "Swift Playground Books" which anyone can create and distribute via a static website (download the template from the Apple Developer site) - you don't have to pay Apple a dime or go through a review process.

It's not Python, of course, but it does give you an idea of what is possible.

Are you trying to find one to use, like Codecademy? https://www.codecademy.com/learn/learn-python-3

Or are you trying to re-create a similar platform?

I have been using hyperskills. It is paid though. Exercism is also good.

Codesandbox supports python

I don't know if it's tolerated. But if every student creates its own codesandbox account, they could clone a so-called devbox of yours containing your python challenge. Devboxes have a terminal so you may even make moderately interactive programs with them

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