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I feel like you could replace the word "programming" with any moderately complicated profession or skill and it would be equally as viable. Programming is curre
by marknutter 13y ago
I feel like you could replace the word "programming" with any moderately complicated profession or skill and it would be equally as viable. Programming is currently in vogue right now so naturally it's going to seem like it's important to learn, even if the person learning it doesn't become a programmer. I'm not sure I buy that premise. Teach kids how to problem solve, sure, but programmers are not the only people who solve problems.
- Already__Taken 13y agoThey are the ones who have by far the lowest barrier to entry (arguably zero), even better is your tools can also be used to teach how to use them. Learning metal shop could teach you a similar skill set about putting together something reasonable complex but you can't just be put in a workshop and figure it out.
- vanderZwan 13y agoHaving done both, I'd say you shouldn't underestimate the power of thinking "with your hands" that you'll learn from doing working with metal, wood, or any form of traditional craftsmanship really. For some people it is much better suited as a way to engage the abstract than programming ever will be.
- GeneralMayhem 13y agoSure, that's true, and it's the place that math had in a classical education - logic, geometry, and so on - before it was perverted into the purely practical plug-and-chug.