[Gllug] App development for children

[David L Neil]

>>> Yesterday's Evening Standard carried an article on Nick Cleggs speech
>>> at the Google conference.
>>> All schoolchildren are to be trained in how to develop 'apps' for
>>> iPhone and Blackberry.
>>>
>>> Does this fill you with depression also?
>>
>> No.
>>
>>> Teaching the next generation
>>> to parrot the developments of this generation,
>>> because its successful, innit?
>>
>> So should they be taught non marketable skills? Or should we contact a
>> medium to foresee the technologies that will be useful in the future? I
>> for once declare my crystal ball needs an upgrade of OS.
>
> They are already being force-fed MS Office, which even the
> stuck-in-the-mud government department I work for is trying to abandon
> in favour of an OS alternative.
>
> All the "IT skills" taught in schools are worthless with the possible
> exception of typing!  It's not a question of crystal-ball gazing, it's
> simple common sense (sadly lacking in both education and government).
>
> The iPhone is increasingly a software "blind alley", and is being
> abandoned by programmers in favour of the Android offering because
> there's a much wider market for it...  The Blackberry is even more
> obscure, and will go the way of the Apple effort soon enough.
>
> The two preponderant phone / tablet operating systems will be Android
> and Windows.  Android will probably win out in the end because despite
> all the massive amounts of money that MS can throw at the problem, they
> have NEVER managed to get a mobile operating system anywhere near right!
>
> It's interesting to see the reaction of people when they discover that
> the underlying OS beneath Android is Linux.  Google have been very
> clever with their marketing and the large numbers of Android devices
> being shipped right now demonstrate that Linux (albeit a small sub-set
> of Linux) has found a widely accepted niche!


When I was involved in this (at the Tech and Uni levels) I championed a 
process of teaching CONCEPTS. Partly we had to do this because there was 
even greater variety of (say) word processors then, than there is today 
- and we had large numbers of trainees but multiple labs running 
disparate s/w - so the policy was also an attempted solution of the 
physical problems.

Accordingly (and sticking with the same example) the concepts of a line 
and a paragraph were explained (ie don't press 'Return' at the end of 
each line, per an el.typewriter; it now indicates end-of-para!). Then 
after the talk, we would split into groups and the different computer 
labs. The first step would be to list the actual commands ON THAT 
MACHINE to perform the newly learned functions, eg Ctrl+C, Ctrl+Insert, 
or some Fn-key to copy material to the 'clipboard' (in fact I think we 
called it by the more generic title: 'scratch-pad'), etc.

Similarly, even in the training arena, we taught concepts of programming 
- which was (also) a convenient means of injecting modular and 
structured approaches (as they were called, again, back-then); and even 
though the ?good old days? of the Fortran and COBOL combo left quite a 
space between languages and thus similarities/concepts/commonalities 
were harder to illustrate (cf relating Python and PHP, or Pascal and C++!).

We didn't get into it, but similar possibilities exist in 
robotics/process control, and no doubt portable device concepts also.

I have met ex-trainees since, years even decades later, and often times 
the comment has been along the lines of: I've used many (eg) wp 
pkgs/prog.langs since that course, but by understanding the concepts 
I've been able to transition easily (move with the times)...


This is (only?) possible when you are blessed with 'qualified' or 
experienced staff (of like mind/team approach!). However school teachers 
'back then' (and maybe still now?) had absolutely no idea and likely had 
never used computers themselves. Often times they were taught by the 
tech who installed the PC, and so it was very much at the 'push this 
button' level. Microsoft 'manuals' and MS-Press books (and the like) 
have historically maintained that standard. No surprise then that 
teachers are unable to relate 'the real world' nor to teach more than 
the mechanisms of a particular tool (no doubt: as provided by some 
benevolent local authority/govt department who are similarly vague about 
both 'future needs' and those of teachers/trainers when they made and 
imposed the tool choice).


There is a terrible confusion between "education" and "training". At one 
time at least we had some separation with universities epitomising the 
former to the point of "knowledge for its own sake" and 'pure research'; 
whereas (poly) techs offering vocational training at the behest of 
industry groups (standards?) and firmly aimed at putting people into 
jobs or supporting on-the-job/apprenticeship programmes.

Adding schools to the mix and expecting them to produce 'ready to work' 
results is plainly a pipe-dream. As the previous poster said, 
'education' - not 'training'. I'd rather high school grads could read, 
balance their bank accounts, cook, handle electrical appliances safely, 
... Yes I'd include typing/keyboarding, word processing, data(base) 
processing (etc) in that list of basic knowledge for 'the modern world'. 
After that learning a particular package is, ahem, child's play!


BTW let's not be too arrogant about FLOSS in this. Learning the 
mechanics of OOo Writer is no better than memorising the keystrokes for 
MS-Word! Tools is 'tools' and neither pkg does more than illustrate 
'concepts'. Learning the concepts of word processing equips one to 
tackle either - or both - products, AND whatever other is thrown at you 
into the future!

In short, learning concepts equips for 'change' whereas training targets 
only a certain, specific, and temporary environment.

-- 
Regards,
=dn
--
Gllug mailing list  -  Gllug at gllug.org.uk
http://lists.gllug.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/gllug