As you build, try to look at specific devices and learn how they work. For example, the touch button is a Boolean switch. It has only two states, true and false. Try plugging it in and dropping the touch icon into the right port and watching the switch toggle back and forth.

Also important is the way electrical parts of the LEGO work. You might want to look through the LEGO manuals to find out more before going on to the next stage.

Then try to click the mouse on the icons and experiment with making your devices work. Once you've played with that and decide you'd like to try something new, go to the Command Center and try entering one line commands.

Before you send instructions to any device, you have to tell the computer which device it should send the instructions to. This is done by talking to the device, the same way you would talk to a person. So the code would look like this:

talkto "car_motor

The quotation marks are there to tell the computer that the device name is car_motor.

You should try to experiment with using many of the commands outlined on the Command Sheet. (You may want to print out a copy of this sheet to make it easy to check.) Try setting the power and decreasing the speed of your device. Try reversing directions and learn how to talk to the specific side of a motor to make sure it only goes one way! Look up the onfor and wait commands and figure how they work. Try all of the commands if possible!

Here's an example of a real life situation to illustrate the if statement:

Let's say your room hasn't been cleaned in a month and your Mom says, "If you don't clean your room right now you are grounded!"
What is the condition? (Cleaning your room)
What is the consequence? (Being grounded)

Well, it works the same for programming.
If the touch sensor is true (the switch is pushed 'on') we want the lights to turn on.
What is the condition? (Touch sensor is true)
What is the consequence? (Turn the lights on)

The example code for the last one is if touch [talkto "lamp on]

To get a better understanding of the syntax take a look at the example programs or use the help command in the software .

After this point, you should choose Procedures from the Pages Menu. This is the page where you write your program. Make sure not to write out the entire program in the Command Center one line at a time. There is a big difference between the procedures window and the Command Center: one is for a programming, the other is for line by line command entry.

The program is the hardest part. Before you actually try to write out the program, you might want to write down in detail what the program should do (what you want your device to do) depending on different conditions.

Note that you can have multiple programs in the procedures file. Each program can call another program that was written later on in the procedures file. For example:

To Program1
talkto "car_motor onfor 10
Program2
end