I've tried something like what you're describing. Most years I'd start with a week or two of solving problems that don't involve any code at all.
For example, a day one teaser (these are 12 year olds) I liked to give was an 8 by 8 grid on the floor. They would get in groups and devise a way to move from a start to an end location. Then they would enact it, first me receiving their directions and later other students. I would of course take their directions a literally as possible, with them frequently getting exasperated ("that's not what I meant!").
We'd go from that to generalizing some rules and formulating steps. Once they had working rules, I'd add obstacles or change the start and end locations.
My goal with these was to develop the skill of seeing discrete, reusable steps, and how they mirror each other between problems. Learning loops and conditionals without ever writing coding, for example. Seeing the need for variables as storage, etc...
For example, a day one teaser (these are 12 year olds) I liked to give was an 8 by 8 grid on the floor. They would get in groups and devise a way to move from a start to an end location. Then they would enact it, first me receiving their directions and later other students. I would of course take their directions a literally as possible, with them frequently getting exasperated ("that's not what I meant!").
We'd go from that to generalizing some rules and formulating steps. Once they had working rules, I'd add obstacles or change the start and end locations.
My goal with these was to develop the skill of seeing discrete, reusable steps, and how they mirror each other between problems. Learning loops and conditionals without ever writing coding, for example. Seeing the need for variables as storage, etc...