A 'Radical Manifesto' For Computer Teaching In English Schools

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A 'Radical Manifesto' For Computer Teaching In English Schools

Posted by timothy on Saturday March 31, 2012 @09:23PM from the it-clicks-the-mouse-or-else-it-gets-the-hose-again dept.

00_NOP writes "Everybody (or almost everybody) in England agrees that computing teaching to kids in high school is broken. In response the government promised a radical overhaul and a new curriculum. But then last week it was discovered the government had scrapped the bit of the education department that would develop any such curriculum. Not to be deterred, John Naughton, the Cambridge University academic who wrote the Short History of the Future, has now published his own 'radical' manifesto on how computing should be taught."

20 of 108 comments (clear)

here's my radical manifesto by Anonymous Coward · 2012-03-31 21:34 · Score: 5, Insightful

1. Don't teach computing;
2. Instead, improve teaching of the basic subjects: mathematics, English, science and at least one foreign language, to pre-Thatcher standards, i.e. before the national curriculum and privatisation of exam boards and replacement of O-levels with GCSEs destroyed secondary education;
3. Well-prepared minds will be able to build on this foundation to do anything they want in their spare time or later years, including computing.
1. Re:here's my radical manifesto by Nursie · 2012-03-31 22:58 · Score: 3, Insightful
  
  Computers are now ubiquitous. That so many people think of computers as black boxes is a crime.
  As is this ludicrous strategy I keep hearing on slashdot that we should just teach 'the basics' to kids. It completely backwards. You should teach kids as wide a range of things as possible in their early years, giving them exposure to as many different subjects and as many different facets of life as we can manage. Later they use that grounding to pick their way to a specialism.
  What's destroyed secondary education in the UK is the bizarre insistence that everyone be put in the same class, regardless of ability, so the smart kids get bored, the less academically inclined get frustrated and everyone loses.
  Bring back per-subject streaming, expand the network of grammar schools, and watch things pick up.
2. Re:here's my radical manifesto by Dr_Barnowl · 2012-04-01 01:11 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  It's a different world ; the culture of "bedroom programmers" we had in the UK grew up in the wake of the 8-bit home computer revolution.
  The computer systems sold today emphasise pre-packaged software and it's utility. The computers of the 8-bit era emphasised experimentation and learning - they all shipped with a programming language and a manual. Most of them booted straight into the programming environment.
  The Raspberry Pi is an attempt to recapture some of this culture. But it has so many other things to compete with. Back then, kids TV in the UK was only on 2 channels and occupied only a few hours a day. Once it stopped, all you had to do was read, or use your computer. Now there are multiple channels that run for much longer hours, an internet full of possibilities, games consoles, portable devices, etc.
  It's much harder to get a hook into that natural childlike curiosity. It's much easier for parents to use the pre-packaged computer systems to occupy their children, and much more likely, because they have better marketing budgets. Part of the reason RasPi is gaining the traction it has, is because those of us who remember the BBC Micro are interested, but I would bet you it's not even on the radar of most of the younger generation (unlike Moshi Monsters). I know that curiosity is there - my 7 year old daughter was charmed yesterday by the ability to control a flashing LED from an Arduino - but how many parents these days are geek enough to have an Arduino lying around, or have the time to help their children work it out?
  Back in my youth, simple computers that you had to understand to use were the only game in town, now the best games in town are in full 3D. I think the Young Lady's Illustrated Primer had this right - you have to start simple.
Re:Worry about language first by Gordonjcp · 2012-03-31 21:48 · Score: 3, Insightful

So, it's a Bad Thing that they speak Punjabi as a first language? And yes, if it was Welsh or Gaelic then it would be a great example of progressive education saving their heritage...
Re:Worry about language first by TheRaven64 · 2012-03-31 21:54 · Score: 4, Insightful

You say that they don't speak English, but the link you reference says they don't speak English as a first language. You need a very strange set of priorities to consider a million school children being bilingual is a bad thing.

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No, England by ebcdic · 2012-03-31 21:59 · Score: 4, Informative

There are similar issues in the rest of the UK, but this particular story is *not* about the UK as a whole. Education policy is devolved to the Scottish, Welsh, and Northern Irish parliaments/assemblies. The manifesto is addressed to Michael Gove, who is the Secretary of State for Education in England.
1. Re:No, England by 00_NOP · 2012-03-31 22:42 · Score: 3, Informative
  
  Actually he's Secretary of State for the whole UK and has some duties in this regard, but yes, he's responsible for the curriculum only in England, so the story is correct to focus only on England.
Why stop there? by F69631 · 2012-03-31 22:12 · Score: 4, Insightful

Why teach science? Surely you can only teach math and well-trained minds can pick up science on their spare time or later years?
From TFM (the fine manifesto):

We believe every child should have the opportunity to learn computer science, from primary school up to and including further education. We teach elementary physics to every child, not primarily to train physicists but because each of them lives in a world governed by physical systems. In the same way, every child should learn some computer science from an early age because they live in a world in which computation is ubiquitous.
Everything from banking to communications to public transport relies on computers these days so it seems obvious to me that everyone should have at least basic understanding of computer science concepts / how computers work, instead of viewing them just as magic boxes. I honestly can't see why that shouldn't be taught in schools...
1. Re:Why stop there? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-03-31 22:19 · Score: 5, Insightful
  
  Why teach science? Surely you can only teach math and well-trained minds can pick up science on their spare time or later years?
  
  No. Science involves observation and experimentation skills which aren't present in mathematics. To science, mathematics is a tool - it does not have primacy, and we cannot assume that something mathematically simple is scientifically correct. Otherwise we'd still be modelling the universe like Plato.
  
  Everything from banking to communications to public transport relies on computers these days so it seems obvious to me that everyone should have at least basic understanding of computer science concepts / how computers work, instead of viewing them just as magic boxes. I honestly can't see why that shouldn't be taught in schools...
  Everything in the world is built on the laws of physics, but only a small proportion of things are built on computer systems - however skewed the view appears to the technologist. A "basic understanding" of computers, i.e. an understanding which takes them beyond thinking in terms of a black box and instead in terms of mathematical and physical concepts, requires a couple of afternoons of attention from a smart, well-prepared schoolkid.
2. Re:Why stop there? by F69631 · 2012-03-31 22:29 · Score: 3, Interesting
  
  A "basic understanding" of computers, i.e. an understanding which takes them beyond thinking in terms of a black box and instead in terms of mathematical and physical concepts, requires a couple of afternoons of attention from a smart, well-prepared schoolkid.
  I think you're greatly underestimating how long it will take to teach/grasp everything from the basic understanding "ok, so it's these 'logic gate' thingies that use electricity..." to the basic understanding of concepts such as databases (no matter how you try to compare them to excel), network topology, encryption (not that they needed to learn the algorithms but the basic understanding of concepts such as public keys would be pretty great), etc. etc. takes if the student has never herd of them before.
  Of course, we might just greatly disagree about how much everyone in modern world should understand about computers.
3. Re:Why stop there? by DoofusOfDeath · 2012-04-01 00:07 · Score: 4, Funny
  
  Well, sure, but we can't all have jobs developing CNC software that controls the machinery that makes wooden salad bowls to be used in clothes-making factories!
  You insensitive clod.
4. Re:Why stop there? by dgatwood · 2012-04-01 04:17 · Score: 2
  
  Learning about programming by learning about turing machines is like learning about how to design skyscrapers by learning about cave dwellings. In theory, they are distant cousins. In practice, learning about something so incredibly primitive doesn't really help you much unless your goal is to spend the rest of your life as a theoretician.
  You can't learn programming from the bottom up because the bottom isn't useful by itself. You can't learn programming from the top down because then you get a bunch of people who think Excel macros are a perfectly cromulent programming language.
  You need to learn programming from the middle (or at least from both ends simultaneously). Control flow by itself would be boring and hard to learn, so you instead start by learning I/O to a text screen and almost immediately jump down eighteen levels to cover control flow. Once you understand the concept of control flow in the context of actual, working code that does something you can interact with in an interesting way, everything else starts to look like special cases of control flow.
  Then, after you've shown them that coding can be fun—that you can change things and get different results—then you back-fill with knowledge of how some of that stuff happens (RAM, ROM, etc.). And after people understand how to write basic code, then you start to introduce flowcharts for more complicated code. If you introduce those things too early, everybody's eyes glaze over, and then you've lost them.
  
  --
  Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
"Computing teaching" by Psychotria · 2012-03-31 22:19 · Score: 2

What the hell is that even supposed to mean? "Teaching computing" I could understand, but "computing teaching" is a very odd thing to say or write. It doesn't say what it's meant to say!
Who here didn't teach themselves how to computer? by dpqb · 2012-03-31 22:21 · Score: 2

I'm not talking about majoring in computer science. I'm talking about basic knowledge of computers through using them and your own inquisitiveness?
One of the misconceptions about education is that you can teach intelligence, curiosity or interest. Not everyone is the same nor born equal and on the same note, not everyone belongs in college especially not if it means going tens of thousands of dollars in debt, whichever humanitarian thought that was a good idea, good job. So, not everyone belongs on the computer and there's Windows and Mac for them :p
Re:Who here didn't teach themselves how to compute by Nursie · 2012-03-31 23:02 · Score: 4, Interesting

I taught myself because my education failed me, then I went to university and studied them. If I hadn't had a friend who was interested in them and who exposed me to the idea they did more than play games, I probably wouldn't have even known that computer programming was a thing that you could do.
Your own inquisitiveness is good, but you need to at least expose people to the basic concepts to trigger it.
Re:Who here didn't teach themselves how to compute by TheRaven64 · 2012-03-31 23:16 · Score: 4, Insightful

Schools teach, but they also demonstrate your ignorance to you. The best education is the one you give yourself, but that's of no use if you don't know what it is that you don't know. I had a few programming classes in school when I was 7. It wasn't enough to give me a detailed knowledge of programming, but it was enough to let me know that it was something that I was interested in learning and to motivate me to learn most of the rest on my own time.

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This is not radical by cuby · 2012-03-31 23:56 · Score: 2

This is obvious. Like in England the "CS" curricula in Portugal (where I am) teach how to use Windows or Word and not the science behind computers. Piking in a analogy used in the manifesto. Teaching specific this commercial software is like teaching how to listen songs of Lady Gaga in a music class.

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Math is beautiful... e^(pi*i)+1=0
TEDxTokyoTeachers Presentation by wynand1004 · 2012-04-01 00:54 · Score: 2

I can't agree with this more - programming is one of the key literacies of the 21st century. Programming is as vital a subject to teach as music, art, or poetry. The skills gained by learning programming are applicable in almost any domain - skills such as analysis, abstract representation, and logic.

I recently gave a presentation at TEDxTokyoTeachers on this exact subject entitled "The Guitar and the Smart Phone". In it, I use the guitar as a metaphor (analogy?) for the way we are using computers in education and why that approach falls short of teaching the skills students need for the 21st century.

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An invasion of armies can be resisted, but not an idea whose time has come. - Victor Hugo
Re:The UK, not England... by arth1 · 2012-04-01 01:57 · Score: 2

Please! Don't forget the Isle of Man, Jersey and Guernsey!
A good visual guide: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:British_Isles_Euler_diagram_15.svg
Re:I teach at my 7 year old sons school and... by acefsw · 2012-04-01 04:46 · Score: 2

Well, that sounds like a really stupid implementation of technology. Really though, I see no need why everything has to be cutting edge to understand the basics. We were taught some very elementary COBOL and BASIC, and if you wanted to learn more, FORTRAN was also an option. I had quite a few of my peers go into the tech/programming industry and I think being exposed young piqued their interest and having learned a language enabled them to tackle the languages taught at university because they already had a good grounding in the concepts of implementation. For instance, having learned Cobol/Fortran probably geared them to be able to learn C at university, and later in life/work picking up another program language like Python/Java or whatever is probably not that hard because your mind is accustomed to thinking in those terms regardless of the various syntax used. Just my .02. Personally, as a non-geek, it at least allowed me to use the IBM PC Jr, (POS, later got the XT), my Dad gave me for college--manipulating my autoexec.bat, etc. was not formidable because I had at least an elementary idea of what was going on, to RTFM if need be, and those concepts proved helpful for learning to use later DOS versions, etc. Plus, while hardware may have changed since, I still think those beasts accustomed me to being able to use the latest new thing now without trepidation--at the very least, I don't have to bother some geek to clean my registry, try out Linux for fun, change a hard drive, add a card, etc. Basically, I think it only needs to prepare the mind to think in those terms and not necessary to have mastered the latest language. Teaching kids SIMPLE or some such in elementary school would aid this and then later a more complex language--heck you could probably still teach BASIC and it would serve the same purpose.