Estonia To Teach Programming In Schools From Age 6 307
An anonymous reader writes "With the launch of the Raspberry Pi, computers are becoming affordable again for the younger generations. Now what we need is kids learning about computers in greater detail, including what the hardware is inside the box, and how to create rather than just use software. Estonia looks to be the pace-setter in this regard, and has just announced that it is introducing computer programming learning for all children attending school. By all, I mean from grades 1 through to 12, meaning children as young as 6 will be writing their own code and producing software. The program is called 'ProgeTiiger' and is being introduced by the Estonian Tiger Leap Foundation as a pilot scheme to some Estonian schools this year. Next year the program will expand, adding programming groups for older kids who want to carry on activities outside of the classroom. Eventually it looks as though ProgeTiiger will become just another standard part of the curriculum, just like math and language studies are."
Re:Why not? Alan Kay might ask (Score:2, Interesting)
While I agree with the idea you present, I have to say that there is nothing wrong with teaching someone to address a problem step by step. The need to learn how to handle the turtle, before they can understand how to handle exceptions.
Really what they need is work with something like LOGO through 4th grade, basic through 6th, Pascal to 8th, and c++ until they graduate. It should be mandatory for all. Worst case scenario is you have a guy in his garage building a machine that builds a rake to give to the machine he programmed to clean up leaves. It could be worse.
No matter what, LOGO sucks but it is better than having every high school student wishing he wrote Angry Birds (Wheres the TM), while flipping burgers. It cant hurt!
Age 6 is a little bit too early, methinks (Score:2, Interesting)
Teaching programming to a 6-year-old kid is a little bit too early
The art of programming is not about programming itself. It's much more than that.
The person who does the programming must first have a grasp of logic, and it's not an easy task for a 6-year-old kid to grasp the concept of NOT, OR, AND, XOR and all those shits yet
Especially for a kid who is still in a state of "blank sheet".
If you want to teach a 6-year-old programming, you just gotta hafta "pre-programmed" that kid beforehand
In my own experience, I started to teach my kids simple logic when they were age 3 - simple concept of logic, away from all the computer jargon, in every-day-life setting
By age of 4 to 5 my kids could easily grasp why this thing won't work this way, and have the ability to think of new ways to solve (simple) problems by themselves
Only by then I started them with the good-old LOGO language
Putting a kid at 6-year-old through the programming routine might sound nice, but I am afraid of the unintended consequences - that the kid might be psychologically scarred for life
My 2 cents