introducing 'be a dinosaur'

Bear is just getting to the age where he recognizes letters and words in writing, and from the moment I started learning programming, I knew I wanted to build something that would help him develop those skills. I'm not afraid of screen time for him as a flat rule, but I do like his online time to be enriching and constructive. A lot of the content out there aimed at kids is just garbage, and I want him to spend time doing productive, learning activities, not just watching kids unwrap toys on YouTube.

Around the time that Bear turned four, I was feeling pretty ambitious about the coding that I'd done so far. So, I told Bear that when he turned five, I'd build him a computer game for his birthday. And then I promptly wished I hadn't said it, because that's a super daunting thing to promise to your child, so I figured that 364 days out from his fifth birthday, I'd better get started.

I immersed myself in online tutorials in Javascript, and I started hacking pieces of a computer game together. It was so hard. At times, I felt like I'd never get this done, like I was just beating my head against a wall with nothing to show for it.

And yet -- I'm starting to realize that that's how you learn. After a few weeks of tearing my hair out, I managed to build a game where Bear could spell a simple word, and then I added some more, and then I added more, and changed it and tweaked it, and debugged, and then built another one for math, and changed that one around, and debugged again... and that's where we are today.

When I first started programming, I was such a beginner that it felt a little silly to share what I was working on. But as time has passed and I've gotten better, I've also become more open about sharing these projects. I'm pretty proud of how far I've gotten, and it gets easier every day!

So I figured I'd share it with you guys too. :-)

Projects like this are where I'm spending most of my creative time online these days, so I figured it was time to share them on this site. If you guys are curious about what I'm working on, or if you have kids and you'd like to see some simple, fun games for them to play, check it out!