From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.3 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00,INVALID_MSGID autolearn=no autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 1696ae,97188312486d4578 X-Google-Attributes: gid1696ae,public X-Google-Thread: 1014db,6154de2e240de72a X-Google-Attributes: gid1014db,public X-Google-Thread: 103376,97188312486d4578 X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-Thread: 109fba,baaf5f793d03d420 X-Google-Attributes: gid109fba,public X-Google-Thread: fc89c,97188312486d4578 X-Google-Attributes: gidfc89c,public From: stei0113@maroon.tc.umn.edu (Andrew J Steinbach) Subject: Re: Should I learn C or Pascal? Date: 1996/07/24 Message-ID: <4t49om$ebi@epx.cis.umn.edu>#1/1 X-Deja-AN: 169831339 references: followup-to: comp.lang.c,comp.lang.c++,comp.unix.programmer,comp.dos.programmer,comp.lang.ada organization: University of Minnesota newsgroups: comp.lang.c,comp.lang.c++,comp.unix.programmer,comp.dos.programmer,comp.lang.ada Date: 1996-07-24T00:00:00+00:00 List-Id: Darin Johnson (djohnson@tartarus.ucsd.edu) wrote: : > A sizeable portion of the class, : > however, whined because they talked to "big, smart people in the real : > world" who told them they were wasting their time, no one uses Scheme, : > it's a stupid language, you can't do XYZ like you can in C or : > whatever, man, universities are stupid, this country is fucked up : > blablabla. : Unfortunately, this group exists regardless of what you teach or how. : I've TA'd and proctored a variety of classes (programming and : architecture), and you don't get away from them. And it's not just : that they want the university to be a trade school either, I had : people in '81 (back when you had to know a variety of things and be : able to adapt in order to program) and they were complaining about why : they should learn Pascal since they already knew BASIC and didn't need : this intro to programming class. They didn't do that well in the : class however. Had a student complain about why he should learn how : compiler work since we already have a good C compiler. And of course, : plenty were upset that they had to learn about the eniac or : computability or PDA's or what-not. : Of course, IMHO, I think the solution would be to take the military : route. Don't reason with the students, make them do laps or pushups : instead. Call them names and insult their mothers when they claim to : be smarter than you. Get rid of all their preconceived notions in : boot camp so they can actually learn something later on. (what, do : students actually say "only wussies use Pascal in the real world" at : West Point?). Absolutely. "We know what's good for you. Your ideas are invalid and stupid. Now swallow everything we feed you, because it is the WORD." Free thought, opinions, what a concept. Ugh. Have you considered that these people may actually have *valid* complaints with Scheme? : The old saying goes, "he can write Fortran in any language". Which is : just a way of saying that you can present a programmer with any : language you want, but if they can't program well you won't get a good : program at the end. This is true, but the choice of language does make a difference in the final result, too. I do have a problem with using Scheme as a learning tool in intro courses. Why is it wrong to teach students basic algorithms and data structures using a language which they probably already know? Most intro CSci students aren't programming virgins (well, at least the ones I know). -- Andy Steinbach stei0113@maroon.tc.umn.edu