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Google: Poor Kids Might Grasp Macbeth If They Code Like Kids At $43K/Yr School
theodp writes: While the CollegeBoard warned against drawing a causal link between learning computer science and improved learning in other subjects, Google has no such qualms. "CS is much more than computer programming and coding," writes the Google for Education blog in a post announcing a new gateway for Google's CS education opportunities. "It's a gateway to creativity and innovation not just in technology but in fields as diverse as music, sports, the arts, and health." Among the technology showcased at the gateway is Pencil Code, a programming tool for beginning coders that Google boasts is already helping kids attending the $43K-a-year Beaver Country Day School to brush up their Shakespeare by having students create interactive chatbots that play the part of characters like Lady Macbeth. "After completing this code I knew more and understood more of the play," begins one student's featured testimonial. "It allowed me to interpret Macbeth in a new way that I had never thought of before. I really enjoyed using Pencil Code because it made coding simpler for me and helped me try something new." Elsewhere on its CS gateway, Google laments that a new Google-Gallup Research Study shows that 'Blacks and low-income are less likely to have access' to such computer science opportunities.
I don't doubt that learning to code can train a child to think logically and be creative, but I would put the increase of knowledge of the play down to merely spending more time with the play, rather than coding itself. The conclusion of the study seems to be very self-serving.
Exactly. Every time I see some article like "Why You Should Teach Your Kids How To Code" or "How Can Coding Can Make the World a Better Place", you can always find some executive that all really wants is more, MORE cheap labor, higher margins, whatever that costs the profession. Seriously, fuck the "why everyone can code -- and should!" initiatives.
Well, learning such a testimonial by heart is certainly less work than learning the part of Lady MacBeth for a class play, and the language is more akin to the sentence fragments school kids communicate with these days than Early Modern English, too.
At any rate: stereotypical behavior patterns/roles are only remotely connected to stereotypical speech patterns, so I don't really see how chat bots play into understanding MacBeth.
To me that seems like a lot of hogwash intended to impress computer illiterate people in order to make them less adverse to computer fadism in education.
Just another example of the classically American naive conceit that "poverty happens" to people randomly, like a strike of lightning from the blue, and not (mostly) from a series of really bad life choices, something which is plausibly heritable.
My point isn't that poor people can't enjoy Macbeth, but teaching them to code isn't going to make a person like something they didn't enjoy before,, either.
-Styopa
maybe if google paid their taxes you wouldnt have this problem, you have to admire their chutzpa though,
they want to get involved in public education but dont want to pay for it at all,
meantime your schools have to beg for pencils http://www.donorschoose.org/
you should be running them out of all education/government contracts
Yep. And how about things like:
"How to appreciate learning"
"How to think logically"
"How to negotiate a better salary"
"How to be self-reliant"
"How to deal with your emotions as a teenager when your hormones are running wild (aka: You're not the first one to ever have that problem)"
Seems like when there's a hot subject, we push for kids to learn that, when really, it should be more like things that kids can practically use and apply everywhere.
Some people don't believe in fairies. I don't believe in The Patriarchy.
You know, a good quality education, and engaged parents can probably go a long way to fostering both ability and aptitude.
From what I can see, kids are like sponges. All things being equal, give them opportunities and teach them, and they'll just get better.
But pretending like CS is some mag bullet which makes all kids smarter and excel at all things is just plain fantasy.
The one and only time in school I was sufficiently afraid of failing an exam than I intended to cheat, I spent a bunch of hours reviewing it, summarizing it, making tiny little notes I could use for cheating ... and found myself in the class realizing that, quite shockingly, I understood the material.
I don't think it's the magic of creating a chatbot which made these kids understand Macbeth. I think it's the fact that they spent time studying and interacting with it on a level other than simply reading through the play.
I'm all for giving kids access to computers and encouraging them. But I think it's a complete crock to claim that the act of learning to code improved their understanding of Macbeth. The act of studying Macbeth in a personal way improved their understanding of Macbeth.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.