On Sat, Feb 02, 2002 at 08:25:14PM -0000, Nick Clarke wrote:
On Fri, Feb 01, 2002 at 01:44:31PM -0000, Chris Howells wrote:
I don't study GNVQ IT myself, but the final straw came when I heard that the school had just bought VB to teach their students (they were origignally going to teach C++ or Delphi but couldn't afford the site licenses.
The best way to learn programming IMHO is unix shell. If it must be on a Windows platform then they could use perl, or for an oo language python or Java.
Sorry, but after more than 20 years teaching programming in Schools and Colleges from the youngest to degree level, these would not 'cut the mustard'
Students of all ages want their programs to look nice.
Do you know what? I don't care what the kids want, I want what's good for them.
They will spend hours making a simple program like a metri/imperial convertor look the part.
Hours wasting their time polishing turds.
Like it or not, it is Windows that has made them expect this. As a C programmer I would like them to learn C, followed by C++ ...
I wouldn't. They'd get bogged down with pointers & casts etc. They should learn on a garbage collected, non-strongly typed language....without a GUI.
but they would be discouraged very quickly by what appear to be drab programs.
If they were put to task to program a Cartesian/Polar co-ordinate convertor, a Fibonacci tree generator, Imperial/Metric convertor or such like then they'd find it challenging irrespective of what language they're using or how they are developing it. What the program looks like is a total irrelevance, it's what it does & how it does it that's the interesting thing & by pandering to their supposed preference/interest in an IDE/RAD you are hence focusing their attention away from the interesting bit; in essence you're failing your pupils based on your own uninformed prejudice. You're also encouraging them to take away the same prejudices as you & come away thinking that the only way to program is using a complicated IDE/RAD. The text editor/command line option has the additional advantages over the IDE in that they don't waste time having to find their way around the IDE and nor does the teacher for that matter. The financial waste goes without saying and what's more they'd be able tp program at home without any expense should they wish to do so.
VB or Delphi are the only real options.
Prejudiced drivel.
(C Builder would be better, but for some reason it has never caught on as I would personally like it to) Kylix has just arrived, and this may change things a bit.
I've told you why C/C++ are not suitable languages for secondary school students & your suggestion that they are shows you know little about programming and even less about teaching programming.
Even at advanced level GNVQ students are not expected to produce fully operating GUIs as well as fully working programs, only the latter.
Quite right too.
If a student of mine can produce a program that does what it sets out to do, and the interface is generated by a RAD like VB they will get all of the marks available.
& what if they write the same program using Java, python, perl...? No marks because the interface is a command line? Why can't they use Javascript & a browser if they want pretty pictures? At least they'd get to grips with object-orientation and html.
If they produce a cute interface with no program behind it, or they drop out through becoming bogged down in the detail, or they fail to complete the task - they will fail the Unit.
So the sensible thing would be to deny them the opportunity to waste their time on a fancy interface & hence fail, wouldn't it? But you're giving them the opportunity to do so & by your choice of software implicitly encouraging them to waste time & fail.
VB is a ticket to nowhere - it's platform dependent & it's unlike any proper oo or procedural language so the skills learnt aren't really transferable to other languages, it will also inevitably get dumped in favour of .NET.
I totally agree, however students would not succeed with other languages as they would not complete the work to such a high standard.
Meaningless nonsense. What `standard'? My standard FWIW: the program works & doesn't have any bugs in it. You have to elaborate as to why only VB of all languages can achieve this `high standard'.
As an aside, although I think GUI RADs are the only way to teach programming in schools and colleges, on a personal level, it does stick in my throat a bit to teach structured top-down programming, and then use a system that is so bottom up it untrue, however I believe students MUST be able to succeed in any task they are set, hence the doublethink.
As I've already indicated, IMHO, you don't know how to teach programming & just because you've got 20 yrs experience of doing it the wrong way doesn't mean diddly.
All the languages I've mentioned will give you a head start if you go onto uni to do cs.
Sorry must differ here. Recently surveying 10 Unis around the Midlands none demand that potential undergrads had studied programming - the usual comment is 'we'll teach them all the programming they need to know' First languages were a very mixed bunch including Modula2 Pascal ADA C and even VB!
I know that unbelievably there are some uni's teaching VB, quite simply these people have got a hide to call themselves universities. You obviously don't understand my point that any reasonable language with conditional statements, looping constructs etc. will give them a head start at uni. Whereas programming on a platform dependent IDE in a language that's universally acknowledged as leading to poor programming style & which doesn't have a hell of a lot in common with other languages doesn't.
As a professional teacher I need to use the tools that will teach students in the most successful way. I think that there are many reasons to go open source, but the balance must always be between available expertise, cost and efficacy. VB is very much more effective as a teaching tool, well known and there are many good teaching resources available, so the cost may be overbalanced.
How do you know what's best when you refuse to countenance the possibility that students can learn a language quite happily using a text editor? I'm not making it up - there's at least one person on this list who's pupils use vim to program...happily & successfully.
We pay for the tool that works best, not the cheapest, or indeed the one that is ideologically the superior.
You've given the game away. You obviously think that: paying = best Which kind of indicates that you have indeed got an idealogy about software - and a not very healthy one at that.
I have introduced Linux resources into every college and school I have workind during the last 10 years - but because they were the best for the job, not because I wanted to break any company's grip on the market. Remember that a market is a place where people buy - and until there is a exact alternative - they will continue to buy. I suggest that we get back to the original idea of this thread and try to put together a distro that will enable schools to MANAGE their computer networks as easily as with RM Connect. With 400+ machines on our network we rebuild up to 20 a week - not because they are totally broken, but because with limited technician time it is quicker and easier to do this than to troubleshoot a 'flaky' machine. 30 minutes after putting in a disk and hitting reset the system is back up with all software installed and it is available to use totally from then on.
In your 20 yr experience how often do you have to rebuild a unix box? How much technician time do you suppose you'd save if all the boxes on your network were linux?
Until an alternative system can do that we cannot expect hard pressed schools to even consider Linux.
You'll be waiting a long time for unix machines to fall over at a rate of 5% a week, so I guess by your criteria you'll never be able to consider Linux.
Climbs down off soapbox and settles down to do some real work on my Linuxbox - but that is as a consultant, not in school!
God help your clients....and your pupils. -- Frank *-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-* Boroughbridge. Tel: 01423 323019 --------- PGP keyID: 0xC0B341A3 *-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-* http://www.esperance-linux.co.uk/ Real programmers don't comment their code. It was hard to write, it should be hard to understand.