Interview by a 15 Year Old • Hacker News Board

Re: Interview by a 15 Year Old

#11

Post by notahacker » Sat, Nov 07, 2015, 5:18 PM UTC

vdaniuk wrote: post #5

kercker wrote: post #2

"I think all kids should learn how to program at some point. I'm not sure what's the right age." I do not think all kids should learn how to program. I think programming is just one of many skills that one can master, not a must-have skill.

>I think programming is just one of many skills that one can master, not a must-have skill. Programming/coding/software engineer is, probably, the only skill that provides high income opportunities, freedom to relocate, a global market and low financial cost of entry. Unless a kid is coming from a rich family, learning programming among other skills is her/his best bet at achieving a decent quality of life. Also, say…

Most white collar professions in the developed world offer high income opportunities, freedom to relocate, global markets and low financial cost of entry without having high-school level programming skill or wealthy parents as a baseline requirement.

Re: Interview by a 15 Year Old

#12

Post by Retra » Sat, Nov 07, 2015, 5:20 PM UTC

kozukumi wrote: post #4

choxi wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I assume PG meant that every kid should learn how to code like every kid should learn how to write, not that every kid should become a professional programmer or writer.

Even then I don't really see the point. If you want to teach kids problem solving skills, logic, breaking down a problem, etc. then that makes much more sense as it is applicable in many areas of life but spending an hour a week for several months teaching a kid how to make a little game in Python isn't really going to benefit them at all in the long run in my opinion.

That is the point: to teach problem solving skills. Programming practice buttresses mental modeling techniques and helps one imagine realistic solutions to technical problems.

There is another goal though, and it mimics writing. If only the 'elite' know how to write, then history will be written by the powerful. If everyone knows how to program, this increasingly popular communication medium will be less under the control of a biased few.

Re: Interview by a 15 Year Old

#13

Post by scrollaway » Sat, Nov 07, 2015, 5:22 PM UTC

kozukumi wrote: post #4

choxi wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I assume PG meant that every kid should learn how to code like every kid should learn how to write, not that every kid should become a professional programmer or writer.

Even then I don't really see the point. If you want to teach kids problem solving skills, logic, breaking down a problem, etc. then that makes much more sense as it is applicable in many areas of life but spending an hour a week for several months teaching a kid how to make a little game in Python isn't really going to benefit them at all in the long run in my opinion.

You don't see the point in teaching kids the fundamentals of how every machine in their life works?

Media and politicians right now are abusing the fact that a large amount of the population is tech-illiterate. People can't comment on issues that affect their lives in major, invisible ways because they don't know the implication of, say for example, banning encryption (cf. uk politics currently).

This has to change and it starts with education.

Re: Interview by a 15 Year Old

#14

Post by vdaniuk » Sat, Nov 07, 2015, 5:24 PM UTC

notahacker wrote: post #11

vdaniuk wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I think programming is just one of many skills that one can master, not a must-have skill. Programming/coding/software engineer is, probably, the only skill that provides high income opportunities, freedom to relocate, a global market and low financial cost of entry. Unless a kid is coming from a rich family, learning programming among other skills is her/his best bet at achieving a decent quality of life. Also, say…

Most white collar professions in the developed world offer high income opportunities, freedom to relocate, global markets and low financial cost of entry without having high-school level programming skill or wealthy parents as a baseline requirement.

Your argument doesn't match my observations of the current job marketplace in developed countries and is in conflict with most predictions of future.

Re: Interview by a 15 Year Old

#15

Post by Alex3917 » Sat, Nov 07, 2015, 5:27 PM UTC

kercker wrote: post #2

"I think all kids should learn how to program at some point. I'm not sure what's the right age." I do not think all kids should learn how to program. I think programming is just one of many skills that one can master, not a must-have skill.

> I think programming is just one of many skills that one can master, not a must-have skill.

For a fifteen year old kid these days, if you graduate from college not knowing how to program then pretty much you are going to have a shitty life. You already need to know how to code to get pretty much any decent job -- not just for web developers, but also for marketers, designers, data analysts, biologists, filmmakers, finance, advertising, manufacturing, transportation, etc. You don't have to be a professional developer for your entire career, but if you don't know how to code then even if you want to go into marketing or whatever, pretty much the best job you'll be able to get is just harvesting leads for minimum wage and then entering the data into Excel.

Don't want to learn to code? Doesn't fucking matter, that's what society is willing to pay for.

Re: Interview by a 15 Year Old

#16

Post by SRasch » Sat, Nov 07, 2015, 5:32 PM UTC

"The combination of forces that produced the default curriculum was so random"

This seems true and sad. What would be a first principles approach to "What should every kid learn" if we were to start from scratch you think?

Re: Interview by a 15 Year Old

#17

Post by dreamdu5t » Sat, Nov 07, 2015, 5:34 PM UTC

Alex3917 wrote: post #15

kercker wrote: post #2

"I think all kids should learn how to program at some point. I'm not sure what's the right age." I do not think all kids should learn how to program. I think programming is just one of many skills that one can master, not a must-have skill.

> I think programming is just one of many skills that one can master, not a must-have skill. For a fifteen year old kid these days, if you graduate from college not knowing how to program then pretty much you are going to have a shitty life. You already need to know how to code to get pretty much any decent job -- not just for web developers, but also for marketers, designers, data analysts, biologists, filmmakers, f…

Hyperbole. Programming is a fraction of the jobs in this economy, and it's not even the largest employer when it comes to STEM. People in medicine, finance, or small business don't need to code.

Re: Interview by a 15 Year Old

#18

Post by Alex3917 » Sat, Nov 07, 2015, 5:41 PM UTC

dreamdu5t wrote: post #17

Alex3917 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think programming is just one of many skills that one can master, not a must-have skill. For a fifteen year old kid these days, if you graduate from college not knowing how to program then pretty much you are going to have a shitty life. You already need to know how to code to get pretty much any decent job -- not just for web developers, but also for marketers, designers, data analysts, biologists, filmmakers, f…

Hyperbole. Programming is a fraction of the jobs in this economy, and it's not even the largest employer when it comes to STEM. People in medicine, finance, or small business don't need to code.

> Programming is a fraction of the jobs in this economy

Yeah, but they're the fraction that don't suck and aren't going away in ten years. And again, most people with jobs that require knowing how to code aren't actually developers. E.g. it's difficult to get hired as a customer retention marketer without knowing how to code, but most of those folks also aren't coding on a regular basis, if ever. It's just that when you have 500+ people applying for any decent job, the person who thought it wasn't a good use of their time to spend 3 months teaching themselves to code is almost always going to lose out to one of the other folks who did, just on the off chance that those skills actually come in handy or whatever.

Is it unfair? Maybe. But that's just how it works.

If you were to look at my HN comments from the early days of the site, you'd see that I was pretty much the poster child for saying that learning to code wasn't necessary. And back then I don't think it was, because the tools were so shitty that to be any good at it pretty much meant that you had to forgo being good at anything else, including other skills that were potentially much more valuable like business or marketing or whatever. And it's hard to pinpoint exactly when, but at some point over the past ten years that has definitely changed.

Re: Interview by a 15 Year Old

#19

Post by myth_buster » Sat, Nov 07, 2015, 5:46 PM UTC

  Is there anything else that isn’t taught to young students that you wish would be 
  incorporated into the material, or any other thoughts on education?

I can't comment on the US education system, but back home I think one of the most important ingredient missing from my school education was _Critical Thinking_ [0]. I happened to stumble upon this field by happenstance and was baffled why this is not integral to our education. I attributed this to the assumption that free thinking and critiquing adults is not what an authority/regime would want. Additionally most teachers/adults don't want to be bombarded by "why"s to which they don't have an answer. But then there is also the Hanlon's razor.

[0] Wiki def: intellectually disciplined process of actively and skillfully conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and/or evaluating information gathered from, or generated by, observation, experience, reflection, reasoning, or communication, as a guide to belief and action

Re: Interview by a 15 Year Old

#20

Post by eropple » Sat, Nov 07, 2015, 5:56 PM UTC

kozukumi wrote: post #4

choxi wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I assume PG meant that every kid should learn how to code like every kid should learn how to write, not that every kid should become a professional programmer or writer.

Even then I don't really see the point. If you want to teach kids problem solving skills, logic, breaking down a problem, etc. then that makes much more sense as it is applicable in many areas of life but spending an hour a week for several months teaching a kid how to make a little game in Python isn't really going to benefit them at all in the long run in my opinion.

How about Excel?