While looking through a book on amazon, I was led to Peter Norvig's site, and to a short, interesting essay. At the bottom of that essay, it lists two languages I haven't run into before, Alice and Squeak. OK, I have sorta seen Squeak before, since I knew it was part of the One Laptop Per Child project, but that's about it. The OLPC is a pretty cool idea, and I'd kinda like to get one (and give one). But it's not much more than a toy until it supports Java... and I'd need it to support Java so that the kids could use it to play Runescape (i.e. use it as a toy!).

Teresa is also looking for a way to teach some kids programming as part of the robotics club she's mentoring. Perhaps one of these languages would work....