[pjc50]

Assembly is not that difficult if you pick a suitable target and environment - possibly a virtualised one for early learning. Make sure you can single-step cleanly. And this is really how computers "think", while C is full of traps that fall between the language abstraction and the compiled realisation.

(The book "C traps and pitfalls" remains one of the most instructive programming books I've ever read, and more languages could do with one)

[vortico]

C is a good enough approximation to the level students need. Many will never use or even think about assembly again, especially on the architecture they happen to be taught, but most will use some derivative of C syntax and semantics. For the 25-50% that will, sure, that'll be a good third language, but remember that most will develop web frontends or industrial logic for the rest of their life.

[bernardino]

> Many will never use or even think about assembly again, especially on the architecture they happen to be taught, but most will use some derivative of C syntax and semantics.

This is deems true in my case. At my community college, I took a lower division Computer Architecture course, also known as Computer Organization and Assembly Language, a year or two ago and I recall little from it unfortunately. Yet, I still go back to the practices I learned from taking a course in C.