Ode and education: Today computer technologies impact virtually everything we do and yet we still treat programming and related topics as some sort of a niche special interest ... even at the college level it's seen as some sort of arcane specialization rather than an integral part of the educational framework.

The first 'why Ode' post is maybe best described as an essay discussing what I believe to be some of the problems with how we introduce new students (i.e. anyone tackling programming and other related topics for the first time) to programming and computer science. I describe the essay as a proposal, and that's essentially what it is. As such, it doesn't dig very deep, and I don't make much of an attempt to justify my assertions. This next article, for lack of a better term, is a more thorough, formal effort. From the introduction:

This paper is a survey of current educational methodologies and concepts, including:

• Constructionism and discovery learning
• Technological fluency and relevancy
• Collective intelligence and distributed cognition

I will provide an overview of these, and consider how they might be applied to computer science education.

I propose a general class of tool that might be utilized to integrate these into introductory CS education in a way that complements existing practice.

The goal was to familiarize myself with educational theory, including current work, and to establish Ode and tools like it clearly within the context of existing research and practice. As discussed in the first 'Why Ode' post, I don't believe we do enough to teach programming.

Today computer technologies impact virtually everything we do and yet we still treat programming and related topics as some sort of a niche special interest. Before college, it's all but ignored. Because of this, even at the college level it's seen as some sort of arcane specialization rather than an integral part of the educational framework. In my experience, even within CS departments, there's not enough legitimate teaching going on - at least not the teaching of introductory material.

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This is an actual paper that I wrote as an independent study as I was finishing up my master's degree. At that point I had already started working on Ode and wanted to try to establish that it had some real educational merit.

The paper assumes no prior knowledge of programming, computer science, or educational theory.

The following are passages pulled from the paper intended to give you some sense of the character of the document so that you can decide if you're interested, before you go to the bother of downloading it. I would describe these excerpts as a collection of snippets rather than a summary. Be aware that the pdf is just approx 32 pages.

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Constructionism

Constructivism is an educational theory which supposes that people gain knowledge and learn from their experiences by constructing an internal representation of the world around them. The existing representation forms a framework which can be extended to assimilate new information which in turn leads to a better understanding of the world.

Constructionism is a refinement of this idea which adds the qualification that people learn best when they create tangible constructions (e.g. physical objects, environments, narratives) that model the internal representations of their ideas

Technological Literacy, Fluency and Relevancy

We can clarify the distinction between technological literacy and technological fluency if we think in terms of the more common example of natural language. In this familiar case, itÕs generally understood that a literate person is someone who has acquired a minimal comprehension of the language. He or she might be able to read and understand what has been written or spoken by others but fail to grasp the subtlety and nuance of what has been said.

It was Seymour Papert who first proposed the notion of technological fluency to refer to the ability to use and apply technology in a fluent way, likening it to language fluency and emphasizing the importance of utilizing it Òeffortlessly and smoothly, as one does with language."

Collective Intelligence & Distributed Cognition

The notion of collective intelligence is a shared capacity to acquire and apply knowledge that comes from the collaboration and contributions of many individuals.

Collective intelligence can be considered a subcategory of the broader concept of distributed cognition, which is the idea that knowledge and learning exist not just in the minds of individuals but that both are distributed among the members of groups (often referred to as a Ôcommunity of practiceÕ in the literature) and the tools that are utilized in the process of learning.

I propose that we should strive to introduce computer science and related topics to more young adults as they are deciding what to do with their professional lives, so that we might help them see its relevance to their goals and ambitions, in hopes of bringing more people into the field while equipping students with new approaches to problem-solving that can then be applied to other areas of interest as well.

It seems obvious to say that computer science is an increasingly important field of study given that many 21st century problems stem directly or indirectly from the introduction and integration of new technologies as it inevitably plays a role in virtually every facet of human culture and community. Not surprisingly, this has lead to any number of advancements, but also corresponding problems: We are able to extend human life expectancy and sustain a larger world population through better healthcare (i.e. increased effectiveness and availability of medical technologies) and improved sanitation among many other factors. But this has contributed to devastating ecological issues. In the same way, increased connectedness among the people of the world thanks to improved travel and global communications has led to a better understanding and appreciation of our current diversity and accomplishments but also, increased unprecedented competition and financial interdependence on a global scale in a way that we seem to struggle to comprehend much less control and coordinate.

the emphasis has shifted toward utilizing technology as a resource to allow for the construction of novel educational solutions. Sometimes this is quite literally the case; that is, that technology is utilized as a basic building block, such as the MIT Media LabÕs Crickets project.

Of course, this idea need not be so literal. I contend that we can consider CS itself to be an immensely grander expression of what is at first an apparently simple idea, from which we can construct a universe of solutions to an infinite number of problems.

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