I tell friends to play with javascript.
* Any web page has source code to learn from.
* Small edits to said source pages show instantaneous results and are painless.
* No need for a comand line, which scares some people.
* The GUI changes, like changes ol to ul, or adding table cell padding, or changing styles, or easy and fun.
* Adding loops and conditionals are not very complicated, since most web pages with javascript provide sme examples.
Overall, for someone curious about programming, it's about the best self-taught intro I can think of. Anyone who wants to learn mroe can find out if the like the concept, the puzzles, and the headscratchers with just as much time and thought as they want.