Re: Fun with C

[Georg Bauhaus <rm-host.bauhaus@maps.arcor.de>]

Peter C. Chapin <PChapin@vtc.vsc.edu> wrote:

> It would be an interesting experiment to try that, but I'm not sure it
> would help in the long run. In later courses I want them to write programs
> that compile and work so they will need to deal with that issue sooner or
> later. Which is easier to teach first? It's unclear.

one thing seems certain, though.

(1) it is students who should learn all those things.
(2)  "we" know a certain minimum if things that
must be understood in order for the whole to
make "sense"

from (1) it follows that we can inquire into what
students already know.
from (1) it follows that we can ask professionals
for help with what they can possibly grasp
(amount and diversity of information, for example)

Then build a formal model, approximate, of
learning capacity.

From (2), it follows that there exists a model
of computation that is didactically complete.
(Meyer writes about such a model.)

The choice of subjects and languages, then,
is a matter of matching the two above.

It is a good hint IMHO that our masters
learned how to program computers that
were a lot simpler than a PC!

And do not start introductions to the
basics of computing by giving detailed
explanations of 7 segment displays.