"We LOVE Logo (Adventures)... it has been a wonderful part of our homeschooling. I have been spreading the word among my homeschool friends, too, because it is an area where there is a need for 'curriculum' and most of us are not equipped to teach these skills." -- Christine Michaud, a military wife.

Many homeschool families have used this curriculum. See what others are saying about it!

A well-educated child is one who loves to explore, investigate, and create.

It's that sort of mind-set that inventors of the Logo computer language at MIT sought to foster.

Using our Logo-based homeschool curriculum, kids have a blast creating geometric drawings, creating simple animations, and combining those skills to create a "board game" and an animated greeting card. While having fun bossing the turtle on the screen around, the kids are learning logic painlessly. Sound like good brain exercise? You bet!

The kids command a tiny robot turtle carrying a pen and a bucket. They tell it where to go on the page, giving commands like "forward 50" (go forward 50 turtle steps). The turtle draws lines as commanded and dumps colors. For animations, the turtle assumes a variety of shapes.

Not only is Logo great for teaching reasoning to young kids, but it has all the bells and whistles of a robust programming language, including parallel processing. So it's a natural for teaching game programming. Skills learned on it transfer easily to other languages. In fact there are many computer professionals out there who got started by learning Logo. To find one, just ask around! My curriculum uses Logo as formulated in MicroWorlds software.

Logo Adventures is planned for learning once a week for one hour. Here's what's in Logo Adventures:

13 drawing lessons covering:

• Simple lines and squares
• Stop signs and E's
• Clocks,
• Tessellations: figures that fit together like floor tiles
• Drawings and collages too.

13 animations lessons covering:

• A silly story about a giant scared by a small person
• A simple board game, "Yellow Brick Road"
• A crowded park scene
• A bouncing ball that draws a clown face
• An animated birthday card, full of shooting stars

There is also a troubleshooting appendix and an answer key. See the Table of Contents. See a sample chapter.

See student work from Logo Adventures on my Gallery page.

How do we make these games? Here's some code from an animation:
setsh [skater1 skater2 skater3]
seth 90 repeat 100 [fd 1 wait .01]

Besides the book, the second component of the Logo Adventures curriculum is the disk for MicroWorlds. This is provided by a Canadian company, LCSI, that worked closely with Logo's creators at MIT, and sells to top-quality schools around the world.

There are two disks to choose from: the earlier version, MicroWorlds 2.0, and the later version, MicroWorlds EX. The earlier one, 2.0, is often chosen these days because it costs $39 less than EX. But it is only useful for Windows 95-XP. The older 2.0 is beloved by purists who use it to teach programming. Here's why:

• It has a nice big screen.
• It has plenty of room to write programming code and see it all at once.

EX, on the other hand, has more finely drawn animation pictures, and is arranged so the code and the graphics are all on the same screen. It is for Windows 2000 and later or Mac OS X version 10.3.9 and up. If you have Windows 2000 or XP, you can choose either one.

What about tech support?

• I have tutorials to get you started.
• Check the appendix on troubleshooting and the HTML guide in the back of the book.
• Look at my FAQ on the Support page.
• If all that fails, email me with your question at info "at" motherboardbooks.com. I answer emails as soon as I can, normally within a day.

What if you want to add the books for older children, Computer Science Pure and Simple, to your order?

Order one of the Computer Science Pure and Simple Curriculums, which includes a disk, and then also buy just a Logo Adventures book below

Shipping: Flat rate $9.99 for USPS Priority Mail to United States addresses. Those outside the U.S., please place your order and expect an email with quote for additional postage charge.

Logo Adventures EX Curriculum, $129.99: Logo Adventures book and MicroWorlds EX disk

Logo Adventures 2.0 Curriculum, $89.98: Logo Adventures book and MicroWorlds 2.0 disk

Logo Adventures book only (if you already have a disk), $29.99: