Science Buddies: "Ask an Expert"

My child is in 6th grade.

Am I to understand that the project entitled,

Artificial Intelligence: Teaching the Computer to Play Tic-Tac-Toe

is so easy a 6th grader can do it?
We were able to cut and paste to run a player against another.
But to go to the next step and play against the computer, seems to require
a college course in programming.

The language seems complicated.
It seems that this needs to be done by a higher grade? 9th, 10th?
Is a 6th grader really expected to be able to do this?

concerned parent

The project difficulty levels do not match with school grade levels. (See a complete explanation of the project difficulty levels at https://www.sciencebuddies.org/science- ... ulty.shtml)

This particular project is a difficultly level of 6-8. That looks like it lines up with grade levels 7 through 10. It doesn't mean a 6th grader couldn't do it, but it would likely be a big challenge and they would probably need to put a lot of extra time into it.

Note that this project's description also recommends that the student already have some HTML and JavaScript experience. If your child doesn't have that experience, it may be wise that you guide them to a different project.

Here are 2 projects...
https://www.sciencebuddies.org/mentorin ... p001.shtml
https://www.sciencebuddies.org/mentorin ... p002.shtml

recommended as first-time programming projects. Take a look at those and see if they are a closer fit.

If your child has no experience with any programming, these projects will still be tough but doable with the right help. I suggest you find someone (teacher, friend, familly member) that has some programming experience to help your child get started with the basic concepts. Its the kind of mentoring that's best done face-to-face rather than through a forum like this.

I hope this helps. Good luck with the project selection.

Mike