I'm a said millennial parent, although my son really took to programming mostly on his own after I gave him some scratch lessons. He made a simple social network in php and became pretty popular in his 6th grade class for it. He's taught himself Java and loves working on games. While I'm encouraged at his career prospects, I understand the world may change around us and the role of a developer is certain to not look the same in 10-15 year's time. I think its a wonderful hobby that is teaching him to be logical, creative, and resourceful at problem-solving. What's wrong with that?

Absolutely nothing. Well except Java. (Just kidding, Java is fine!).

I'm sort of against it, but Notch got the Minecraft generation hooked on it!