Scratch and programming for kids

Scratch is another graphical programming language oriented towards children. It is built in Java and has a programming environment and a runtime environment. The runtime environment is only needed if you want to share your (read-only) program with others via the web. The programming environment is a little too modal and other ways ridged for my tastes -- that is, with my "kid" hat on. When you watch kids play they clearly have a center and a periphery. Their tools need to model this.