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Before you start 🧭
✅ If you are new to computers or using code editors, you may want someone with a little more experience nearby to help you with the steps in this lesson.
✅ Typing and using the editor may feel slow at first. This is completely normal! You will get faster with practice.
✅ If you haven’t already, complete lesson 0 first to verify your setup and get familiar with the editor and terminal.
✅ Full install guide (editor, uv, Python, Hello World, files): companion SETUP.md.
✅ Stuck? All code examples and solutions are in the companion lab repository.
🎯 Pro tip: you learn faster when you type the code yourself instead of copy-pasting. Short lines beat big paste blocks!
Goals 🎯
By the end of this lesson you will:
- 📦 Store text in variables
- 💬 Ask the player questions with
input() - 📣 Show results with
print()and f-strings - ▶️ Run a small Python file from your editor or terminal
Why a Mad Lib is “game dev” ✨
A Mad Lib is a tiny story machine (grown-ups might say “narrative engine”): the computer knows the shape of a story, and you supply the missing pieces. Bigger games fill in slots too—hero names, item labels, win messages—using variables and text just like you will here.
Mini project: dungeon contract 🏰
You will collect silly words, then print a one-paragraph “contract” for an adventurer.
Step 1 — a file and a first print 🪄
Create madlib.py in your lesson folder. Type:
print("Welcome, apprentice scribe!")Run the file. If it prints the message, your workshop is wired up correctly. ✅
What does print do? (click or tap to open)
print is a built-in Python command that tells the computer to
show text in the terminal—the window where lines of text scroll by.
The parentheses ( … ) wrap what you want to show. The quotes
” … ” mean say these letters exactly (a string of characters).
So print(“Welcome, apprentice scribe!”) draws that welcome line on
screen.
Later, you will print variables too, not only fixed phrases.
Step 2 — variables hold player answers 📦
Variables are named boxes for values.
hero_name = "Alex"
print(hero_name)Here the box is named hero_name and holds the text "Alex".
In Step 3, you will reuse the same name hero_name—first we practiced with a
test value, then we swap in what the player types.
Step 3 — ask the player with input() 💬
input() pauses and waits for the player to type a line and press Enter.
hero_name = input("Name your hero: ")
print(hero_name)The text the player types becomes the value stored in hero_name.
What does input do? (click or tap to open)
input is a built-in Python command that asks the human a
question in the terminal, then waits while they type an answer and press
Enter.
The text inside the parentheses—usually in quotes—is the prompt: the
line the player sees before they type. So input(“Name your hero: ”)
shows Name your hero: and the cursor blinks after it.
Whatever they typed on that line (before Enter) becomes a string value you
can store in a variable with =, like hero_name = input(…).
Step 4 — build a story with an f-string ✍️
An f-string lets you slip variables into a larger string.
hero_name = input("Name your hero: ")
creature = input("Name a ridiculous creature: ")
tool = input("Name a useless adventuring tool: ")
story = f"""
{hero_name} signed a contract to hunt a {creature},
armed only with a {tool}.
Good luck, {hero_name}.
"""
print(story)Run it, answer the prompts, and read the contract aloud if you dare. 🎲
You already used an f-string for the contract. Next is the big picture on regular strings and f-strings—same ideas, with tiny examples you can run in a scratch file.
Strings and f-strings 📚
A string is a sequence of characters: letters, digits, spaces, punctuation,
emoji, or escape codes like \n for a new line.
You can wrap text in double quotes or single quotes for simple strings—this lesson mostly uses doubles.
Triple quotes """ … """ let you write several lines in one
string. That is how your contract can span more than one line.
An f-string adds the letter f right before the opening quotes,
for example f""" … """. Inside the string, curly braces around a
variable name are slots: Python swaps in the current value when that line
runs.
Each line below prints the same greeting so you can compare styles:
print("Hello, World!")print(f"Hello, World!")name = "World"
print(f"Hello, {name}!")Concatenation means joining strings with +:
print("Hello, " + "World!")For many slots (like hero_name, creature, and
tool in your story), f-strings stay the easiest to read.
💡 Hint
If you see a NameError for hero_name, make sure you assigned
hero_name = input(...) above the story block.
Try this 🛠️
- Add two more prompts (for example: a location and a magic word) and weave them into the same story.
- Greet the player using their hero name in the very first line printed.
- Blank lines: experiment with extra
\ninside the f-string to space the story for readability.
Stretch goals 🌟
-
Non-empty answers: if the player hits Enter without typing, ask again until you get at least one character.
🙈 Spoiler direction
Ask a grown-up to read this with you if you want to try it early.Use a
whileloop andlen(...)— you will see loops formally in a later lesson, so this is optional adventuring. -
Second paragraph: print a second f-string that references the same variables so the contract feels longer.
Recap 📝
- Variables remember what the player typed.
input()collects text;print()shows text.- Strings are text in quotes; f-strings add slots so variables plug into a bigger story.
Next lesson (preview) 🔮
Next you will build a guess the number game: logic, branching
(if / elif / else), and while loops so the computer can react to each
guess until the player wins. 🎯