While we had a lab full of computers in high school comp sci, we did all our main work on paper and on the chalk board, and all tests were on paper too. We had

While we had a lab full of computers in high school comp sci, we did all our main work on paper and on the chalk board, and all tests were on paper too. We had to learn to think things through in our heads. At the end of each year was a 3-month development window where we had to write a complete app (game, whatever) start to finish, so we did do some serious code for our age (this was 8-9 years ago now). To this day, I bring a notebook everywhere and jot in pseudocode on the bus, in meetings, anywhere I can. I'm certainly able to think through problems better because of that. Programming is a written language, you don't need a computer to speak it, just to interpret it. And pseudocode is a great art to get good at. Highly recommended if you're looking to pick up a new language, just learn to program on paper and in your head instead. So what they're likely looking at with the paper and pencil test is simply to see whether you can actually think in general, and not just debug your way through an assigned task.