Emotional or what ...

Someone tried to tell me off, via email for my views on Pascal.

Working up a rant and getting into quite a lather, if I was the emotional type, I could have taken it personally. So happy to reply, I suggested that instead of emailing me personally, they might like to try using the public forum of either this blog or the closed community forum we are both part of, and where i started this thread.

They did not seem to like this, declaring my original comments at derogatory.

Um, nope, i asked a question? One that prompted those with an emotional agenda to react, probably because i challenged a notion that what they may be doing, may not be the best thing for their students.

My response was along these lines, funny, they don't seem to have presented a considered response, either via email [tut tut], this blog, twitter, facebook or the community forum. Like the many others, who fall into a range of camps and broadly disagree/agree with my views.

Debate I like, but don't take it personally, it makes you look less than you could be.

I retain my view that if you are to teach serious programming, the language used must be contextually relevant to current commercial programming practice. There are children across the globe in thriving (emergent) economies learning this and often outgunning our offspring in the jobs market for less income.

If they cannot compete, we cannot compete, its not difficult, so please, PLEASE, do not teach outdated languages. It may suit you, but its screwing our kids in the worldwide economy that we are trying to be part of.

Comments

  1. Adam Smith26 February 2012 at 22:40

    You hit the nail on the head here. As I said against your original post about Pascal and as you say here it should be relevant to industry. To me teaching Pascal just demonstrates the disconnect between education (to be very clear in some areas - not all) and what industry actually requires.

    ReplyDelete
  2. weak dead: fight!29 February 2012 at 18:26

    Two things: First, emotional responses might indicate a person with low self-control, which might make you think the person is not really intelligent. Anyway, ad-hominem rationalizations might be wrong as well.

    Second, Software engineering is now a global deal, you have it all over the world at lower prices (India, Mexico, China!, etc) and these kind of details you mention can make the difference.

    ReplyDelete

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