Re: Programming languages for the very young

From: John Doty (jpd_at_w-d.org)
Date: 01/28/04 

Date: Wed, 28 Jan 2004 11:29:29 +0500

In article <cu1d6947h0c.fsf@nokia.com>, "Darin Johnson"
<darin_@_usa_._net> wrote:

> The turtle graphics part should be great, even for older learners of
> programming.

Indeed. The key thing is the primitives: turn, move, penup, pendown. This
allows you to build an analytic geometry without a Cartesian grid, better
connected to Euclid's concepts, non-Euclidean geometry, and relativity. Of
course, you could do this in other programming languages as well. You
don't even need a computer (although a computer is certainly useful).

Abelson and DiSessa's "Turtle Geometry" was a wonderful high school
analytic geometry text based on these ideas. By the end of the book, they
had introduced differential geometry without using calculus, and had even
covered a bit of General Relativity. I read it about 20 years ago. There
was fundamentally nothing in there that someone (like me) who's plowed
through Misner, Thorne, and Wheeler's tome wouldn't know, but the approach
was refreshingly simple: I learned a new way to think about geometry from
the book.

Unfortunately, with the current emphasis on indoctrinating students to
score on standardized tests, there is no way such a nonstandard
presentation of geometry could be taught in most high schools. 

-- 
| John Doty		"You can't confuse me, that's my job."
| Home: jpd@w-d.org
| Work: jpd@space.mit.edu

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