| >>> One of the most dangerous things I’ve seen happen to people who are just starting to code is being told that it’s easy. I've encouraged my kids to learn programming. The one thing I haven't done is tell them it's easy. Anyway, they've seen me in bug hell, so they're under no illusions. But they're no strangers to learning hard things. >>> And they don’t let you in on a big secret: that there is no mastery, there is no final level. The anxiety of feeling lost and stupid is not something you learn to conquer, but something you learn to live with. Yes! Bring it on! Bright kids spend their entire school day at the final level -- 99th percentile on every possible measure. Those kids would benefit from an extracurricular activity with no final level (traditionally, "classical" music) that they can pursue at their own pace. >>> They don’t tell you that a lot of programming skill is about developing a knack for asking the right questions on Google and knowing which code is best to copy-paste. In my view, that's a general skill in its own right, worthy of learning. I fixed my refrigerator and clothes dryer that way. I rarely tackle any technical task without first seeing if somebody has blogged a tutorial. And I grew up fixing things before the Internet age. But I'd start kids on coding without the Google Everything approach. >>> [the anxiety / boredom graph] I enjoyed that. It does seem to ring true. |