On Mon, Sep 18, 2000 at 04:30:02PM +0100, DCR wrote:
Very rare I feel compelled to reply to this group but this one roused me..
Perhaps schools should not be educating their pupils in little more than an ability to push a mouse around and taking instruction from a paper clip.
Shouldn't they perhaps be teaching them to use applications such as bash and vi to get a more solid grounding in how computers actually work? After all most can learn the GUI stuff at home or at school in their own time.
I think that this is just the sort of attitude that damages ICT in schools.
How?
We are not here to make junior computer scientists, but rather to engender an environment of achievement and success in ICT.
I for one am rather sick of seeing children leaving school with little in the way of fundamental knowledge but having been acclaimed by their school as having `achieved' great results and having had their backs slapped in an orgy of self-congratulation by teachers who's primary concern and emphasis is now on results. BTW, I don't blame teachers for that.
For many mastering the ability to use a mouse and operate Office programs is a very real skill, and often one of the most valuable vocational skill they will leave school with.
Yes it is a useful skill but what of their *understanding*? Kicking a football around is quite a useful skill but it doesn't require much in the way of thought either.
We should leave all this GUI stuff for them to learn at home?? Then what is our function as ICT teachers to teach them all to program and nothing else, to scorn at the systems and programs that 90% of the world of work uses?? Surely not.
Your function is to teach them an understanding of the basics. There are kids going to university who don't even understand that a filesystem is a hierarchical tree, filing a file to them is a case of hitting the save button and punching in a name. Most aren't even aware that dos filenames generally have an extension to distinguish them. That's pitiful.
In a school there should be room for all abilities and interests, but lets face it, we need to start with the basics and work up, respect for all aspects of ICT must be cornerstone of any good department.
Yes, you do need to start from the basics but complicated word processing applications are not the basics. BTW, my original post was in error. It was meant to go to WYLUG. -- Frank *-------*-----*-----*-----*-----*-----*-----*-----*-----*-------* | Boroughbridge | Tel: 01423 323019 | PGP keyID: 0xC0B341A3 | *-------*-----*-----*-----*-----*-----*-----*-----*-----*-------* http://www.esperance-linux.co.uk/