latham@bsdpkh.UUCP (Ken Latham) (02/26/86)
> > From: manis@ubc-cs.UUCP (Vince Manis) > >The average introductory student has no longterm commitment to computer > >science, so one ought to teach him/her a directly usable skill; that means > >teaching a language s/he has heard of. > > from: -Barry Shein, Boston University > This is the attitude I object to that leaves us nowhere in Computer Science > Education. I believe one has to abandon the job training mentality and just > teach their subject on the sole assumption that everyone in the room is there > to build a foundation for computer science. If that necessitates opening > a different course for 'programming', so be it. APPLAUSE!!! I have to agree with this as a crucial point in this discussion! If you are teaching PROGRAMMING: use COBOL or FORTRAN they are still in use and are a direct benifit to anyone who wants to get into the job market FAST! teach C, ADA, or some other widespread or "up-and-coming" language as well, later. If you are teaching Computer Science : by all means use PASCAL! (my reasons later) > ... a bunch of CS students who end up believing that CS is a process of > getting the syntax errors out (shuffling the semi-colons, I like to call it.) ( I used to call it "shuffling the cards" :-) ) ( anyone out there remember paper tape! ) > It is my firm belief that: > > a) College is not job-training .... > > b) Computer Science is not programming, nor is it not not > programming. Programming is simply a critical lab skill > that may take more than one intro course to develop properly ... ( Doning Flame-Retardant Suit ) It is my ernest opinion that Computer "Science" is still an ART yearning to be a fulfledged science. The reason I say this is that algorithms are not much use (flame sheild up) unless they can be programmed into a Computer (aaaaa... duhhhhh). Seriously.... the "science of logical problem solving" and the "art of programming" are two inseparable parts of Computer Science. ( or should those be reversed :-) ) (sheild down ... suit off ) My apologies to you Barry for cutting out so much of the good stuff! Ah yes.... PASCAL.... Why PASCAL ....? Strong type checking I have had three separate chances at being a beginning student in Programming101 et. al. Once with Basic ... lots of fun, easy to learn but NO FORM and poor type checking (poor types really)! Once with PL/I .... pretty good ... a little too much provided for you ( what the hell does he mean by that!). It had too many builtin niceties for I/O ... so many of the good complexity level examples are little I/O programs with string processing. Type checking OK. ( Not a BAD choice just not very widespread ) Lastly with .. you guessed it ... PASCAL! The error mesaages were clear and concise (most of the time) as is required by the standard, if I remember correctly. Strong Type checking ... How many times must I say this! My lord, what relief it is to have the compiler tell you exactly what you CAN'T do. I think this is the real point ... The compiler has to be so strict as to not let the student get too inventive ... like C ... The objective is to learn Algoritmic Representation not the language. Even though the language keeps a tight reigh it also has a sufficient array of types ( structures, pointers, sets, etc.) and an expressive enough syntax and semantics to do just about anything. AND don't forget to give them some other language assigments as well ( I suggest LISP or even C ). Small assignments but meaningful, something to let them know ( or let them know they didn't know :-> ) what they were actually taking the course for. There I admit I am a C programmer (and Computer Scientist) that actually LIKES PASCAL!!! Is that my carrer's end looming on the horizon, oh my god, what have I just said, I take it back, I didn't mean it ..... noooooo! O \ --- > O / Ken Latham, AT&T-IS (via AGS Inc.), Orlando , FL uucp: ihnp4!bsdpkh!latham