[plaidturtle]

Personal anecdote: C was the first language I learned while I was in middle school. I taught myself. I admit that I have gained a deeper understanding of C after I recently took Computer Architecture class, but I don't think learning assembly is essential to understanding the C language, stack/heap, and pointers. When I was first learning C, a simple memory diagram with simple description was sufficient. Perhaps the problem is learning a high level language first (most schools start with python or java)? Maybe students struggle with the transition or it isn't explained well enough. I couldn't say since I started with C. I'm interested if anyone had this problem because I tutor students.

[n0w]

My experience was similar. I taught myself C during high school, and found transitioning to higher level languages to be fairly simple after that. C was taught as one of the later languages in my university course, and many of my friends (that started with higher level langauges) struggled to pick it up.