Learning To Code: Are We Having Fun Yet?

theodp writes "Nate West has a nice essay on the importance of whimsy in learning to program. "It wasn't until I was writing Ruby that I found learning to program to be fun," recalls West. "What's funny is it really doesn't take much effort to be more enjoyable than the C++ examples from earlier...just getting to write gets.chomp and puts over cout > made all the difference. Ruby examples kept me engaged just long enough that I could find Why's Poignant Guide to Ruby." So, does the future of introductory computer programming books and MOOCs lie in professional, business-like presentations, or does a less-polished production with some genuine goofy enthusiasm help the programming medicine go down?"

Comments

Re:You're doing it wrong

[ArcadeMan]

PHP is a much, much better choice! Everything just fucking works, even when some parameters are wrong and you're mixing variable types all over the place. /duck

Re:It's all about fun

[SJHillman]

My understanding is that management only hires people who have fun doing their job because management is largely made up of Funpires who need to slowly leech the fun out of their victims, leaving them soulless corpses.

Seriously, why else would they veto Pants-Free Fridays?