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You want to know what they should teach at school? The basics. Programming is the application of basic skills, it in itself is a secondary skill. Which basic
by pinaceae 14y ago
You want to know what they should teach at school?
The basics.
Programming is the application of basic skills, it in itself is a secondary skill.
Which basic skills do I need for programming?
Reading,
Writing (as in Grammar,etc),
Math,
Logic
Over here in Austria we still have the concept of apprenticeship. As a 15-16 year old you can switch over from the more formal academic track to an apprenticeship (more here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apprenticeship#Austria http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apprenticeship#Austria). Coming from a background in constructional engineering I had a lot of opportunity to talk to employers about their opinions on the current apprentices.
Common complaint:
Apprentices coming out of the modern school system are useless. They arrive with practically none of the basic skills. Quickly, we need to cut this 6m board into 2m long pieces - how many do we get out of it? The more intelligent ones reach for their phone to calculate it.
The world has gotten more complicated, we have a lot more knowledge and facts to teach. But a young brain can only learn so much in parallel. The good ones will teach themselves anyhow, read books or wikipedia from back to back. But there needs to be commonality and this one needs to be along the basic skill set of language, comprehension and logic. Why are so many people in debt? Because they can't understand interest if their lives depended on it - which it does.
Teach programming! Teach art! Teach philosophy! Teach whatever I find interesting!
- dagw 14y agoQuickly, we need to cut this 6m board into 2m long pieces - how many do we get out of it? Two, and a leftover piece shorter than 2m. Due to the fact that saw blades have a non-zero width, and you want to err on the side of cutting them slightly too long. What do I win?
- jacquesm 14y agoHi there! I'm from ACME corp, and I would like to introduce you to our - no, your! - new water-jet cutting machine! It cuts anything, including that 6m board there with a cut so fine that you will be able to get 3 pieces of 2m out of a board of 6m, there is so little waste that within the acceptable margin of error for woodworking the cuts will be 0 width. Sold?
- bo1024 14y agoHow will that help me catch the roadrunner again?
- pinaceae 14y agoa kick in the ass by your master for being a smartass usually.
- AndresNavarro 14y agoI found this pretty funny and all but it also reminded me of something my dad always says: "Carpentry is a science of centimeters, not millimeters". Meaning no sane person would ask for a table 2m long and complain that it's 5 millimeters or even a whole cm short...
- phaemon 14y agoNothing, because your answer is incorrect! If you require the pieces to be exactly 2m long without allowing for any margin of error, then there isn't a saw that will cut that accurately, so the answer is 0, not 2. If you allow for the accuracy of the saw, then the answer is 3 since any saw can cut within its own accuracy. :-)
- seanp2k2 14y ago>"The more intelligent ones reach for their phone to calculate it." and I took so much crap in school for refusing to memorize things I could look up quickly (like multiplication tables). What now 3rd grade math teacher; I have Wolfram Alpha in my pocket.
- scrabble 14y agoOn the other hand, I refused to use a calculator all through elementary school and high school. I figured if I couldn't learn to do basic math in my head then I'd be screwed later in life. I don't think I'd be screwed anymore, but I'm happier having those skills without needing to rely on electronics.