Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Japan adding mandatory programming education to all elementary schools

the-japan-news.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 195 posts

Re: Japan adding mandatory programming education to all elementary schools

#121

Post by burfog »

wingerlang wrote: post #67
ploxiln wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

maybe. but text mode is pretty fundamental really. It could be powershell or anything I guess, as long as it had files and commands and was both interactive and scriptable

From your perspective maybe. My whole family use computers daily, some do it at work as well I guess and I would bet the number of times they have needed to go into a shell would be exactly zero. I doubt they even know about terminals to be honest. Simply not needed.

It doesn't seem needed because you aren't used to what you can do with it. If you were good at it, you'd be horrified at the thought of not having that capability.

It's not just about launching programs and moving files around one by one.

A decent shell, like bash, is fully programmable. It lets you express yourself in ways that no GUI does, possibly excepting LabView or Scratch.

Re: Japan adding mandatory programming education to all elementary schools

#122

Post by danbruc »

maruhan2 wrote: post #114
danbruc wrote: post #112

I am torn. Did we do this before? Was it necessary before? Did we try to teach everyone how internal combustion engines or transistors work when they came up? There are of course always a lot of interested hobbyists when something new comes up but it seems the solution was mostly to hide the complexity and have professional car mechanics instead of making everyone an expert in the new technology. May programming be d…

I think differently. Required subjects are required not because they have tangible use but because it's worth to learn them as common knowledge. Literature, history, etc can all be argued as unimportant for sustaining your life. Programming is ubiquitous, and yet there are many people who cannot even imagine what programming is despite having gone through school. To relate to your engine example, ask anyone who has g…

But spending four lessons to learn how a 1980s computer works in the same way you spend two lessons learning how a 1900s internal combustion engine works is very different from teaching programming. I agree though, that would probably be some time well spent.

Re: Japan adding mandatory programming education to all elementary schools

#123

Post by gambiting »

unabst wrote: post #68

In Japan, English is already mandatory, yet, English fluency sucks. Japan recognizes the problem, but doesn't know what to do about it. Basically, English education has yet to succeed. [1][2] This is the thing about Japan. They can make these moves that are incredibly progressive and ambitious -- visionary even, yet, they really have no idea how to go about doing it. As it stands, they don't have enough teachers that…

I guess it's because there is much more to learning languages than having lessons at school. I've had both English and German lessons at school(I'm Polish) since I was 7 all the way to the end of school at the age of 19. So I had 12 years of mandatory education in both languages. Yet my English is completely fluent, while I can't say anything in German. All media I've consumed was always in English, games, films, books, comics - while I never had any reason to use German.

That's why I think that just having language lessons is in no way enough, you also need to have a reason to use a language to actually remember anything.

Re: Japan adding mandatory programming education to all elementary schools

#124

Post by danbruc »

lordnacho wrote: post #120
danbruc wrote: post #112

I am torn. Did we do this before? Was it necessary before? Did we try to teach everyone how internal combustion engines or transistors work when they came up? There are of course always a lot of interested hobbyists when something new comes up but it seems the solution was mostly to hide the complexity and have professional car mechanics instead of making everyone an expert in the new technology. May programming be d…

I think it's more a question of showing the kids that programming exists than making programmers. In the same way, most people don't need to know how to structure an essay in their jobs, they don't need a foreign language, and they don't need to know algebra. But it's a window into the richness of life. Show the kids a bunch of stuff, and they will be able to explore further themselves.

I agree with that but I don't think that is what people have in mind when they argue everyone should learn to program. As I mentioned in Germany we have this, for me it was maybe one lesson per week for a year or two. And this was more than two decades ago.

Re: Japan adding mandatory programming education to all elementary schools

#125

Post by unusximmortalis »

If by programming they mean algorithms and really presented in a fun way then it is great. And next thing is to understand that the best algo one can learn as early as possible is the algo that allows you (teaches you) to learn when you want to do it.

Re: Japan adding mandatory programming education to all elementary schools

#126

Post by imtringued »

simunaga wrote: post #118
sbuttgereit wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gotta be pedantic on this one... Demand wouldn't decrease because of more developers being on the market. Supply would increase. Just because any one developer might be individually in less demand doesn't mean that demand for developers has decreased. Yes, this would still depress salaries for developers. Having said that, there is no fixed amount demand for developers. If development resources are a bottleneck for d…

Interesting. The situation when robots not only take the people jobs but because of the robots new jobs get created, comes to mind. Isn't it similar to that? Yet, I think that robots don't create as many jobs as they take.

Right now a lack of robots is actually the problem. Otherwise we wouldn't even consider outsourcing manufacturing to asia.

Re: Japan adding mandatory programming education to all elementary schools

#127

Post by gruez »

zygomega wrote: post #31

I wish 'programming' included teaching our kids how to be proficient users of technology. How to effectively google, how to bring up a terminal, ssh to another machine, how to secure your privacy are the type of skills I hope are included in this definition. The architectural and process engineering aspects of programming are better left to learn in adulthood.

>how to secure your privacy

Do you think kids still care about privacy? As in, the giving all your life details to google kind, not the public Facebook profile kind.

Re: Japan adding mandatory programming education to all elementary schools

#128

Post by wingerlang »

burfog wrote: post #121
wingerlang wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From your perspective maybe. My whole family use computers daily, some do it at work as well I guess and I would bet the number of times they have needed to go into a shell would be exactly zero. I doubt they even know about terminals to be honest. Simply not needed.

It doesn't seem needed because you aren't used to what you can do with it. If you were good at it, you'd be horrified at the thought of not having that capability. It's not just about launching programs and moving files around one by one. A decent shell, like bash, is fully programmable. It lets you express yourself in ways that no GUI does, possibly excepting LabView or Scratch.

I just don't think most people will ever in their lives need to script their computers to batch rename files and automate tasks. Even if they do need it for something it seems more time efficient to find some GUI app to do it, or get help from someone who already know how to do it (a power user).

I also think that even if this was taught from the beginning - it'd remain a power user thing.

But I agree, I use automation/scripting/bash every day and would be horrified to loose this ability. But I also know other developer who doesn't use it at all.

Re: Japan adding mandatory programming education to all elementary schools

#129

Post by imtringued »

elliotec wrote: post #64
gjolund wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would put it on the same level as literacy and basic arithmetic. It exposes you to entirely know ways to solve problems, a basic understanding of computer science on a societal level would be amazing.

There's no way it is on the same level as literacy and basic arithmetic, at least not for decades if not longer. Literacy rates in the modern world are close to 100%, near the same can add and subtract. Programmatic thinking requires much more effort and skill, at least right now, and that's why we are getting hella paid. It's almost like saying accounting or medicine is the same level as literacy. Or on the low end…

>that's why we are getting hella paid

This has nothing to do with skill. As long as demand is higher than supply for your job you will be well paid. Median wages for lawyers are lower because there is an oversupply of workers on the job market.

Re: Japan adding mandatory programming education to all elementary schools

#130

Post by imtringued »

venomsnake wrote: post #93
ekianjo wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We had mandatory programming in france 30 years ago it did not create a generation of little geniuses.

And in Eastern Europe we had a system of dedicated STEM schools that took kids with aptitude to extend their abilities and now the region is an IT powerhouse. YMMV.

There is a difference between increasing school capacity for specific areas of education than forcing insufficient education on everyone.
Post reply on HN