Our February 2015 class was our first offering in our new Middle School Catamount Kids series. We did a class on computer programming concepts using the LOGO language.
LOGO is a computer language that has been around for some time. It is primarily a 
drawing environment. The drawing tool is called a “turtle.” The turtle sits in the middle of a drawing area, and using a series of commands, the programmer instructs the turtle to move in a coordinated fashion. LOGO is a great tool for introducing computer programming concepts to kids because it is fairly intuitive and easy to grasp basic concepts. It reinforces logic and critical thinking, math skills, geometry, and creativity.
The Catamount Kids really enjoyed programming with LOGO. Here is some information to help you work with LOGO at home. You can download versions of LOGO freely on the internet, and there are lots of websites with information about LOGO.
Using FMS LOGO
The version of LOGO that we used in our Catamount Kids class is called “FMS LOGO.” You can download FMS LOGO and install it on your home computer, and your kids can be programming with LOGO on their own.
To access FMS LOGO, visit http://fmslogo.sourceforge.net/. This page has some great resources, including a video demo, an online user’s manual, and helpful links.
To download FMS LOGO, visit http://sourceforge.net/projects/fmslogo/. NOTE, the FMS LOGO download page is a bit confusing. Here is a screenshot of the FMS LOGO download page. Click the button highlighted by the red arrow in the screenshot to download the FMS LOGO Program on your home computer. It is easy to install and doesn’t take up much space or computer resources.
LOGO Links
Here is a summary of some other useful LOGO links.
FMS LOGO Workshop – a lesson plan for learning LOGO, including fun activities: http://fmslogo.sourceforge.net/workshop/
Turtle Academy – a website where you can do LOGO programming online: http://turtleacademy.com//index/en
MSW LOGO – another version of LOGO with several helpful links: http://www.softronix.com/logo.html
The Great LOGO Adventure – electronic copy of the out-of-print book “The Great LOGO Adventure”. This is a great book to have. You can download it here as zip file with PDFs of each book chapter. http://www.softronix.com/download/tgla.zip
Have fun in your computer programming adventures!
