Re: [Dfey-general-discuss] UK ICT classes killing kids' interest in tech

[Paul Sutton]

On 05/08/10 12:20, Tim Dobson wrote:
> http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/08/05/school_fail_tech/
> 


Granted I am 35,  However perhaps the following would be useful

"especially when so many kids are obsessed with gadgets, computer games,
social networking and playing music really bloody loudly on their mobile
phones."

these things are fun to do,  otherwise why would we play games,

When I was 11 and had a zx spectrum i had access to built in programming
lanaguages (ok sinclair basic and to a point machine code) a lot of
books were written about how not only to program in basic, but also
machine code,  and kids of 11 were doing just this.

As far as I am aware all work now has to be produced using a word
processor, or office application,  hence I would guess you learn how to
use software, for taht purpose, I seem to remember from doing CLAIT and
the follow up couse IBT2,  it was very business orientated, so producing
reports, accounts for spreadsheets etc.

I wonder how many young people out there are not interested in working
in an office, perhaps they want to be engineers, plumbers, or scientist
who would use different software anyway, or use software in a  different
way,

One of the arguments from the guys on the DCLUG is we don't teach how to
use a word processor pacakage,  we teach how to use Word, Excel and
power point etc. From what I have heard it means people can cope wuth
the exact package they are taught on,  move a single button somewhere
and they can't cope,  lets teach people how to use computers and figure
things like this out.

I would suspect however any young people will be clued up enough to find
out what sort of software their industry will use and learn accordingly,
its like learning html using a text editor,  ok its not dreamweaver but
perhapos that makes you a better coder,  it certainly does not mean you
can't go out there and learn dreamweaver,  or if you use open office and
understand how to use it, you apply that knowledge to using any package
that you use at the time.

If you teach terminology, such as what is tabs, line spacing, margines
etc, then you understand the underpinning terminology, this means you
should be confident enough to apply that to any package, even latex

However if a studnet is motivated enough he / she will just teach
themselvess,  and hopefully get involved in the right online forums and
offer help / advice to others, and build up a good reputation online,
even helping friends locally with a  website off your own back, will
look good on a cv.

Just a thought

Paul



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