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A foreign language helps you translate from your native language to another's native language. A programming language helps you translate from the logic in you
by GrahamsNumber 13y ago
A foreign language helps you translate from your native language to another's native language.
A programming language helps you translate from the logic in your head to computer language. Teaching a programming language if the logic isn't there is useless, but trivial to learn the other way around. Not saying this is a bad thing, but the comparison/approach seems inappropriate to me.
- stdbrouw 13y agoBy far the easiest way to learn programming logic is by learning a programming language. It's not that inappropriate.
- pwg 13y agoMy thoughts exactly. While teaching kids the basics can't hurt, designating programming languages as "foreign" is a stretch at best. While they surely seem "foreign" to those who can't code at all (which would likely include the rep. who introduced this bill), they are not "foreign" in the same way that German or French or Spanish is "foreign" to English. What is different is they are a representation of a logic system, either as a series of steps to carry out, or a set of transformations to perform on data. Teaching a programming language as a "foreign" language, without also teaching the logical way of thinking that allows one to write a program in the first place, will likely not produce the outcome the bill is intended to produce.