SPAM-MED: Re: Time to upgrade my technique...

[Luis]

I tend toward the paper and pencil analogy for variables, paper and  
pen for constants.
It's like the machine has a note pad, pen and pencil inside.

That's something they readily use and are familiar with.

Cheers,

Luis.


On 10 Jun 2008, at 20:15, Richmond Mathewson wrote:

> Richard Gaskin wrote:
>
> "I would agree that what you teach should depend on
> where the learner is on Piaget's scale of cognitive
> function.
>
> But for adult learners, I usually teach fields for
> display and variables
> for computation.
>
> Variables play a central role in the art of
> programming.  One could
> argue that it would be a disservice not to explain how
> to use them well."
>
> This isn't a very nice thing to say, but (you know me
> by now):
>
> Experience has taught me that quite a few adults who
> perceive themselves as would-be programmers don't seem
> to have got
> beyond the 'concrete operational stage'
>
>  (Paiget:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Piaget ),
>
>
> at least as coping with variables goes. I usually
> start with the "buckets" image, move onto fields
> ("visible buckets") and then try variables ("invisible
> buckets").
> The main problem seems to be that, in
> RR/Metacard/xTalk as one does not explicitly define
> variables people often say something like the
> following:
>
> "When I put a number in a field that is easy because I
> have already made the field and I can see it on the
> VDU, but I don't see how I can put a number in an
> invisible thing that doesn't exist."
>
> Explaining that by naming a variable one calls it into
> existence (c.f. Hindu creation and Lord Brahma
> breathing things into existence) doesn't seem to click
> with many people. Personally I don't find it a problem
> because I was 14 when I moved from Fortran 4 to BASIC;
> i.e. while I was still in the 'formal operational
> stage' and had not yet lapsed/rotted/reverted (choose
> which ever verb takes your fancy) back to the sort of
> proto-Neanderthal mentality I now exhibit. Admittedly
> the LET statement (oddly enough) helped me visualise
> variable 'containers' popping out of nowhere.
>
> I will spend some time this summer with some Bulgarian
> kids (who have been taught English by me) on a very
> basic exercise to make a simple calculator in RR; as
> their age range will be between 8 and 12 it will be
> very interesting to see who "gets it" re variables. I
> am not really doing this to teach then programming as
> such, but as a way to speed up their cognitive
> development (something that happens anyway with
> children who learn a foreign language fairly
> intensively).
>
> sincerely, Richmond Mathewson
>