Date   : Sun, 02 Apr 2006 18:35:09 +0100
From   : Andy Armstrong <andy@...>
Subject: Re: Basic & BBC Basic

On 2 Apr 2006, at 17:40, Mark Usher wrote:
> I am only saying, what is wrong with using proprietary systems to  
> teach
> concepts? Universities have been doing it for years. Think about  
> some of the
> newest medical research machines. All proprietary, Siemens,  
> Canon... The
> list is endless, all with students learning on them - even  
> researching using
> them - that is according to your view an even worse scenario!

Oh right - do you want to keep arguing against your interpretation of  
my view? It won't confuse matters if I mix that up with my version of  
my view will it? :)

Many of the tools kids will use at school are proprietary in some  
sense - books, hammers, desks, calculators. They're all made by some  
company that owns the intellectual property inherent in the design.  
There are however qualitative differences between that version of  
proprietary and the version that applies to software. Learning a  
proprietary programming language is closer to learning to talk a  
proprietary human language than it is to learning to hit proprietary  
nails with a proprietary hammer. You're not just ceding control of  
the design of the artifact - you're giving up control of how you  
think about a problem too.

It's understandable that higher education students will learn to use  
equipment from specific vendors - HE starts to be less about  
education and more about training. There's a world of difference  
between that and immersing kids in a technological monoculture at the  
time when they're most voracious for knowledge and most susceptible  
to believing what adults tell them.

Shit, when you've finished telling them that Microsoft == computers  
you might as well hit them with the notion that reality is just too  
darn complex to have been designed by evolution too...

>> So you're advocating even more training and even less education?
> I am advocating a good mix of both. I have had uni grads come onto my
> software team before, and they have totally screwed up on many  
> occasion
> because they have no idea about the practical world, whereas I can  
> usually
> trust someone with 3 years experience and no degree to get the job  
> done.

Same here. We went through a phase of employing only non-CS grads -  
just people who interested in programming.

> It
> is important though to understand why things work the way they do,  
> and to
> question it also. As always, balance is the key. Teaching people with
> non-proprietry systems just because they are non-proprietry is not
> necessarily a good thing. Use proprietry tools to teach generic  
> building
> blocks. What is wrong with that?

In general that's fine - and that's what we do. But if  
ModernLanguageCorp managed to convince the DfES that their new human  
language QuickSpeak should be taught instead of French would you be  
cool with that?

> So why not use a proprietary language to teach concepts that are  
> common
> across many languages used in commercial arenas. At that age, they  
> want to
> see quick and colourful results to keep their interest. Stimulate  
> their
> minds.

Because it's wrong to plant the seed of the idea that a programming  
language should be owned by a single company? Control of language is  
control of thought - and that's not just human languages.

-- 
Andy Armstrong, hexten.net