Comments on: Remarkable data on computer science education http://sciencethatmatters.com/archives/9 hosting cognitive dissidents since 2007 Fri, 25 Jun 2010 16:29:51 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0 By: pde http://sciencethatmatters.com/archives/9/comment-page-1#comment-1090 pde Tue, 11 Mar 2008 17:28:44 +0000 http://sciencethatmatters.com/archives/9#comment-1090 <p>Hi Sam,</p> <p>thanks for pointing that out! This is a real danger with this blog: there's always a chance that the studies we write about look valid, but turn out to be wholly or partially invalid.</p> <p>In this case, I went looking for criticising citations before posting (this was February 2007) and didn't find any. The paper by Caspersen <i>et al.</i> was published six months later.</p> Hi Sam,

thanks for pointing that out! This is a real danger with this blog: there’s always a chance that the studies we write about look valid, but turn out to be wholly or partially invalid.

In this case, I went looking for criticising citations before posting (this was February 2007) and didn’t find any. The paper by Caspersen et al. was published six months later.

]]> By: Sam Kaufman http://sciencethatmatters.com/archives/9/comment-page-1#comment-1088 Sam Kaufman Tue, 11 Mar 2008 16:16:45 +0000 http://sciencethatmatters.com/archives/9#comment-1088 <p>I absolutely found this post intriguing, and it has merit, but I want to mention that 'The camel has two humps' has been a controversial study in the SIGCSE community, and the only replicative study I know of failed to replicate the results (see http://doi.acm.org/10.1145/1269900.1268845).</p> I absolutely found this post intriguing, and it has merit, but I want to mention that ‘The camel has two humps’ has been a controversial study in the SIGCSE community, and the only replicative study I know of failed to replicate the results (see http://doi.acm.org/10.1145/1269900.1268845).

]]> By: Carl Gundel http://sciencethatmatters.com/archives/9/comment-page-1#comment-2 Carl Gundel Thu, 22 Feb 2007 21:02:41 +0000 http://sciencethatmatters.com/archives/9#comment-2 <p>This is a point I make on my own blog over and over. http://basicprogramming.blogspot.com</p> <p>Computer literacy is not just knowing how to start the machine, use email and a web browser, word processing and videogame playing. When personal computers (home computers) first became available the user was thrust into the world of programming as soon at the computer was turned on.</p> <p><strong><em>Super BASIC</em></strong> 3583 bytes available. Ready. <blockquote> <p>_</p> </blockquote></p> <p>Remember that? You were confronted with programming, and it was a good thing. So many people learned to program. Nowadays what passes for computer education is either basic applications skills (too easy) or Java/C++ as an introduction to programming (too hard).</p> <p>Whatever happened to hobby programming?</p> This is a point I make on my own blog over and over. http://basicprogramming.blogspot.com

Computer literacy is not just knowing how to start the machine, use email and a web browser, word processing and videogame playing. When personal computers (home computers) first became available the user was thrust into the world of programming as soon at the computer was turned on.

Super BASIC 3583 bytes available. Ready.

_

Remember that? You were confronted with programming, and it was a good thing. So many people learned to program. Nowadays what passes for computer education is either basic applications skills (too easy) or Java/C++ as an introduction to programming (too hard).

Whatever happened to hobby programming?

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