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Hour of Code 2015 Star Wars Tutorial: Spare the IF Statement, Spoil the Child?

Posted by Soulskill on from the turtle-can-make-no-choices dept.

theodp writes: Teaching U.S. K-12 kids their programming fundamentals in past Hours of Code were an IF-fy Bill Gates and a LOOP-y Mark Zuckerberg. Interestingly, the new signature tutorial — Star Wars: Building a Galaxy with Code — created by Lucasfilm and Code.org ("in a locked room with no windows") for this December's Hour of Code, eschews both IF statements and loops. The new learn-to-code tutorial instead elects to show students "events" after they've gone through the usual move-up-down-left-right drills. With the NY Times and National Center for Women & Information Technology recently warning against putting Star Wars in the CS classroom ("Attracting more female high school students to computer science classes might be as easy as tossing out the Star Wars posters," claimed an Aug. 29th NCWIT Facebook post), the theme of the new tutorial seems an odd choice for Code.org, whose stated mission includes "increasing [CS] participation by women." But if Star Wars is, as some suggest, more aimed at boys, perhaps Code.org has something up its sleeve for girls (a la last year's Disney Princesses) with another as yet unannounced signature tutorial that it teased would be "just as HUGE" as the Star Wars one. Any guesses on what that might be?

2 of 156 comments (clear)

  1. Re:What kind of sexist.... by Raseri · · Score: 4, Informative

    I'm still amazed, and ashamed, that a gender pay gap even exists in 2015

    Good thing it doesn't. That myth was busted years ago. Why are you still believing in it? Do you also believe in Santa Claus?

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/christina-hoff-sommers/wage-gap_b_2073804.html
    http://www.cbsnews.com/news/the-gender-pay-gap-is-a-complete-myth/
    http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052702303532704579483752909957472
    http://www.forbes.com/sites/realspin/2012/04/16/its-time-that-we-end-the-equal-pay-myth/

    Stop parroting stupid shit just because you think it makes you look sensitive and enlightened. It doesn't. It just makes you look like an asshole with no critical thinking skills.

    --
    Writhe your naked ass to the mindless groove.
  2. Re:What kind of sexist.... by ljw1004 · · Score: 3, Informative

    Good thing [a gender pay gap] doesn't [exist]. That myth was busted years ago. Why are you still believing in it? Do you also believe in Santa Claus?
    http://www.forbes.com/sites/re...
    Stop parroting stupid shit just because you think it makes you look sensitive and enlightened. It doesn't. It just makes you look like an asshole with no critical thinking skills.

    I only read your Forbes link, not the others. But the Forbes article says that (1) a wage gap does exist, (2) it doesn't seem to be caused by on-the-job discrimination, and is instead caused by women being disproportionately employed in lower-paying roles.