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Coding - the new Latin

bbc.co.uk

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Re: Coding - the new Latin

#21

Post by Jach »

OstiaAntica wrote: post #7
Jach wrote: post #2

I think that's a horrible phrase. The first thing that comes to mind is: "Coding isn't dead!", then: "But coding has direct benefits, not hand-waving indirect benefits like 'you will get better at English!'" I get that it's meant to convey that if you can't code even a little, you're an uneducated person, much like in older times people who didn't know Latin (and Greek) were uneducated. That's a fine sentiment to hav…

I think the metaphor goes deeper. Knowing Latin (and Greek) opened doors to greater learning, providing access to classical writing and history. Indeed, the Renaissance was built on Latin and Greek study. It also was a common language that united the educated elite across Europe.

That's true. Yet my issue remains: how many people know how important Latin really was for its lifetime? A good metaphor that you want to resound with the broad populace should resound with the broad populace. I don't think I'm alone in thinking "What's a dead language got to do with coding?" as a first thought, and I studied Latin for 3 years. As an example of something I think is easier (nearer) for people to grasp, let's add a new R! Reading, 'Riting, 'Rithmetic, and 'Rogramming.

Re: Coding - the new Latin

#22

Post by m0nty »

Jach wrote: post #2

I think that's a horrible phrase. The first thing that comes to mind is: "Coding isn't dead!", then: "But coding has direct benefits, not hand-waving indirect benefits like 'you will get better at English!'" I get that it's meant to convey that if you can't code even a little, you're an uneducated person, much like in older times people who didn't know Latin (and Greek) were uneducated. That's a fine sentiment to hav…

Apparently Latin is a very popular subject in schools. IF that popularity is genuine, it refutes the idea that children are always looking out for the easiest option, which bodes well for CS in schools because (if it's done correctly) it will be challenging. Personally I have my misgivings about the phrase "The New Latin" but I have strong objections to the "Hey kids! Everything is fun, fun, fun!" approach which is so often the alternative.

Re: Coding - the new Latin

#23

Post by Jach »

tpatke wrote: post #19

When I think about all of the problems with the education system I am not sure that "teaching coding" would top that list. The bottom line is that coding is a profession which is not suited to everyone. I remember being a TA at university in the late 90s when IT was booming. Everyone wanted to learn to program. Once they learned enough to realize it meant sitting in front of a computer alone all day - most moved on t…

> Does everyone really need to know about recursion?

Yes, and I'd argue indirection as well. If you teach coding without recursion, you're just teaching basic logic coupled with arithmetic, we have classes for that already. (As an aside, I think iteration should be introduced as a special case to recursion.)

Re: Coding - the new Latin

#24

Post by _delirium »

tpatke wrote: post #19

When I think about all of the problems with the education system I am not sure that "teaching coding" would top that list. The bottom line is that coding is a profession which is not suited to everyone. I remember being a TA at university in the late 90s when IT was booming. Everyone wanted to learn to program. Once they learned enough to realize it meant sitting in front of a computer alone all day - most moved on t…

One proposal, which I'm somewhat sympathetic to, that a general cognitive skill of being able to think procedurally or computationally is important in the 21st century, even if the craft of being able to program is more specialized.

Some papers on that:

http://www.bogost.com/writing/procedural_literacy.shtml

http://dm.lcc.gatech.edu/~mateas/publications/MateasOTH2005....

http://www.cs.cmu.edu/afs/cs/usr/wing/www/publications/Wing0...

Re: Coding - the new Latin

#25

Post by Jach »

m0nty wrote: post #22
Jach wrote: post #2

I think that's a horrible phrase. The first thing that comes to mind is: "Coding isn't dead!", then: "But coding has direct benefits, not hand-waving indirect benefits like 'you will get better at English!'" I get that it's meant to convey that if you can't code even a little, you're an uneducated person, much like in older times people who didn't know Latin (and Greek) were uneducated. That's a fine sentiment to hav…

Apparently Latin is a very popular subject in schools. IF that popularity is genuine, it refutes the idea that children are always looking out for the easiest option, which bodes well for CS in schools because (if it's done correctly) it will be challenging. Personally I have my misgivings about the phrase "The New Latin" but I have strong objections to the "Hey kids! Everything is fun, fun, fun!" approach which is s…

I actually think Latin's popularity is, at least in part, due to its easiness, and at least in my former high school. I'm inferring to other schools since the AP test doesn't require speaking it. I mentioned in a cousin-comment that I took Latin for three years, I also took French for five. French was a lot harder. Merely speaking it and understanding when it's spoken back with different accents and different speeds is a lot harder than just reading or writing it, which is all I had to do for Latin. (We learned the simple pronunciation rules and read some things aloud but that's it.) Yet for the universities around the area requiring two foreign language credits from high school, Latin was good enough.

Latin was funner for me in some ways though since it has a pattern-matching or puzzle-solving feel to it at times with all the word endings and no reliance on word order. I don't think it's as neat as Arabic but it's a somewhat similar feeling. I agree that overselling things as fun is a great way to kill any fun that might have existed.

Re: Coding - the new Latin

#26

Post by itmag »

kabdib wrote: post #18
philwelch wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe functional programming would be easier to grasp had you not learned imperative programming first.

I never had a problem with this, and my first few languages were BASIC, assembly and C. LISP came naturally to me a few years later. I think the problem is that people are /used/ to imperative programs, and aren't given real practice in functional programming. There are also FP zealots, some of whom maintain that learning IP first causes damage. I think this attitude is toxic and doesn't actually help their "cause" (…

Well, FP is more elegant. But sometimes you just need a chainsword.

Re: Coding - the new Latin

#27

Post by nknight »

itmag wrote: post #5

Why is it that coding is such a rare (relatively speaking) skill? Sure, there are some hard concepts in coding, but for loops and conditional statements are hardly more difficult to understand than a lot of the math which gets taught in junior high. Speaking of that, why is it essential for young people to learn algebra but not to learn for and if?

Algebra is simple. It conforms to a small set of rules that are easily understood, often intuitive, and have few special cases. Problems are small, self-contained, and have clearly-defined parameters. They don't suddenly change on you halfway through the test, they don't have to account for unexpected input, and they don't have to interact with other problems.

Real-world computer programs exist in a large set of arbitrary, often unintuitive rules that are both absolute and malleable, and change between languages and platforms. They have complicated requirements that seek to solve real-world problems that are often ill-defined. They have to cope with unexpected input, hostile input. They are large, comprising hundreds, thousands, even millions of lines of code. They have a multitude of paths that a given piece of input might take, they display emergence.

Coding is not just a simple math problem. It requires clear, detailed reasoning about complex systems operating within arbitrary sets of rules and an unpredictable world.

Related questions might be "Why do people have trouble doing their taxes by hand?" and "Why do people have such a poor understanding of the legal system?". Also, chess.

Re: Coding - the new Latin

#28

Post by bad_user »

tpatke wrote: post #19

When I think about all of the problems with the education system I am not sure that "teaching coding" would top that list. The bottom line is that coding is a profession which is not suited to everyone. I remember being a TA at university in the late 90s when IT was booming. Everyone wanted to learn to program. Once they learned enough to realize it meant sitting in front of a computer alone all day - most moved on t…

     Does everyone really need to know about recursion?
Does everyone really need to know the basics of calculus? Or how about genetics? Does everyone really need to know French? I had classes for the above in my high-school. In fact I can't think of any class I took in high-school that isn't useless to a large portion of high-school graduates.

And I can't think of many examples that are more useful than grasping the concept of recursion.

Re: Coding - the new Latin

#29

Post by mseebach »

nknight wrote: post #27
itmag wrote: post #5

Why is it that coding is such a rare (relatively speaking) skill? Sure, there are some hard concepts in coding, but for loops and conditional statements are hardly more difficult to understand than a lot of the math which gets taught in junior high. Speaking of that, why is it essential for young people to learn algebra but not to learn for and if?

Algebra is simple. It conforms to a small set of rules that are easily understood, often intuitive, and have few special cases. Problems are small, self-contained, and have clearly-defined parameters. They don't suddenly change on you halfway through the test, they don't have to account for unexpected input, and they don't have to interact with other problems. Real-world computer programs exist in a large set of arbi…

Algebra is as simple as the syntax of a programming language. Applying programming to solve real world problems is as hard as applying algebra to solve real world problems - and there is also only a very small group of people able to do the latter effectively.

Re: Coding - the new Latin

#30

Post by tapertaper »

tpatke wrote: post #19

When I think about all of the problems with the education system I am not sure that "teaching coding" would top that list. The bottom line is that coding is a profession which is not suited to everyone. I remember being a TA at university in the late 90s when IT was booming. Everyone wanted to learn to program. Once they learned enough to realize it meant sitting in front of a computer alone all day - most moved on t…

Everyone who spends their day on a computer would get a productivity boost if they learned to code.
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