Why would a 14 year old be taught C++ and low level networking? Familiarizing them with a high level scripting language (like python say) will not do? Will you teach surgery to a 14 year old? Will you teach them to design and construct a building?
> Why would a 14 year old be taught C++ and low level networking?
There is an entry age for learning C++? Tell me more about it.
/s
> Will you teach surgery to a 14 year old?
Apparently high school biology followed by 5 years of undergrad followed by 2 years of grad is the same as learning C++.
Now don't go on a tangent about how CS schools need math foundation and are 4 years and you need grad school for deeper understanding. CS education isn't under contention - C++ is. C++ doesn't need a big foundation. An average 14 year old will pick up C++ just fine.
>The point is that these are not outliers in aptitude. They're outliers in opportunities offered.
Kids that can program in "several assembly languages" (your words) are just outliers in "opportunities offered"?
Even in college, heck, even in CS majors, there are kids that "get it" and kids that do not. So, no kids that are programming geniuses at 10 are not just outliers in opportunities.
Besides, the kids that could not pinpoint their country on the map were ALSO taught Geography. They weren't lacking in "opportunities", they lacked in skills, attention, etc.
>Why would anyone not offer a class in hard stuff to 14 year olds?? 14 is not some tender sensitive age where kids need coddling.
And why would that hard stuff be C++? It's not like it's something good to teach even for adults...
I started learning C++ during my freshman year of High School, that was at about 14. I don't really consider myself an outlier... Hell, I was a pretty typical B+ student from grade school, straight through to my bachelor degree.
C++ was hard, but I had already fallen in love with the magic of making the computer do things with some VB. As a result, I was motivated enough to fight my way through a C++ book.
Kids need a special blend of internal motivation, external motivation, love, and support. Given those things, I promise you that kids will surprise you. Every. Single. Time.
I've met some 14 year olds at http://www.studentrnd.com that code circles around most college graduates. It's not because these kids are intellectual outliers. It's because they have a place to gather with other smart kids and challenge each other to build something just a little bigger and just a little better.
We need to start expecting more from kids and providing them the opportunities to prove that they are deserving of those expectations.
In my class of 200, there were two classes of 15 or so students who took that programming course. My school was an outlier, not me. Kids can do great things if you provide them with the opportunities.
I think C and low level networking are great things for beginners to learn. I started learning C at age 9 and networking around age 12. C is great because it teaches a ton about how computers actually work, and practically forces you to learn CS concepts, without having to go as far as program counters, etc. in assembly.
Low level networking is great because it teaches how properly architected systems are built in layers that each serve a particular purpose. It also helps tremendously when building systems later on in your career.
You have no idea how many "programmers" I have interviewed that can't even write a bubble sort because all they learned was Array.sort(). Starting with C fixes this problem, and sets the stage for proper learning (and appreciation) of high level languages.
The other thing that I would really focus on at a young age is troubleshooting. It teaches you how to think in a way that not many other things can.
C++ was taught in my high school. A good teacher can make C++ learnable. You just focus on using a sane subset of the language and it can make sense to beginners.
Also going from C++ to Java is a lot easier (and others I'd imagine too) because C++ forces you to master pointers. And of course, Java is filled with pointers but the syntax hides it.
It was 1997. I was 6 at the time so I don't know, but probably python/etc. were less known at the time or deploying them was harder than C++ on Windows.
Programmers ought to have a lot less hubris about their subject. The difference in difficulty between imperative languages is not as large as you think - and changes depending on the problem domain.
Networking enables the Internet in much the same way the internal combustion engine enabled modern transportation. Yet apparently only one of these topics is considered reasonable for a 14-year-old to study?
Whether two technologies have analogous roles in two essentially unrelated systems has nothing to do with their teachability to 14 year olds. Some things are just harder. Though in this instance, they could both be taught to talented kids well below 14.
C++ doesn't have web frameworks, and is big and complicated. If you aren't doing web projects, you can safely stick with a subset(with guidance of course). You mention is not being useful - what is that Python can do that C++ can't? C++ is going to be a bit more verbose, yes, but verbosity is not the only variable. Also, use stl(and/or boost) and your code won't be that verbose. This isn't that bad.
#include <set>
#include <string>
#include <iostream>
int main(int argc, char **argv)
{
// Declare and Initialize some variables
std::string word;
std::set<std::string> wordcount;
// Read words and insert in rb-tree
while (std::cin >> word) wordcount.insert(word);
// Print the result
std::cout << "Words: " << wordcount.size() << std::endl;
return 0;
}
It is verbose compared to python, which would do this in about 3 lines. It's also not that great an example because it begs the question why one moment a set of strings ('words' as variable name feels weird to me because I think in c of word boundaries, but whatever) is set<string> (please use 'namespace std') and next moment its char argv. These are obviously simple things to anyone with c++ knowledge, but teaching this to someone is just likely to put them off. There's no reason to use c/c++ today unless you're coding drivers or very performance critical things.
A set isn't necessarily implemented using a red-black tree, most likely its a binary tree of some kind, but why would anyone put that in a comment. It's a set, which just means there's only copy of any repeated 'words'.
I think the reason why c++ doesn't make a good language to teach youngsters is because stl is still a beast of a template library, still spits out garbage error messages and is painful to work with even by the most experienced of developers (25+ c/c++ here)
On the other hand, collections and data structures in python are simple, efficiently implemented and extremely succinct, if the value of a dictionary element contains 2 or 3 elements, or is another dictionary, or a map etc it's simple to do this in python, where as in stl pair<int, int> is great until you need three of them, then its auto_ptr or whatever and it starts to get unwieldy and the poor student trying to focus on the algorithm is now bogged down in the with the inelegance of a low level language.
Don't get me wrong, I love c and c++, but i'd rather teach some python or ruby because they can get stuff done and working and not struggle with tedious syntax.
> It is verbose compared to python, which would do this in about 3 lines.
That can be done as a perl one liner. The C++ program is pretty reasonable as in it matches to the algorithm.
1. Read words.
2. Add words to a set. Set only has unique elements.
3. Print set size which will give you the number of unique words.
> It's also not that great an example because it begs the question why one moment a set of strings ('words' as variable name feels weird to me because I think in c of word boundaries, but whatever) is set<string> (please use 'namespace std') and next moment its char argv.
Questions are good. Questions aid understanding. You are overestimating C++'s complexity and underestimating a 14 year old's abilities.
> There's no reason to use c/c++ today unless you're coding drivers or very performance critical things.
Personally, I think all programmers should have a working knowledge of C or C++. C is the best simulation of the machine. Assembly is closer, but writing assembly is a pain.
> A set isn't necessarily implemented using a red-black tree, most likely its a binary tree of some kind, but why would anyone put that in a comment.
Copied code from the web. Wasn't paying attention. That comment shouldn't be there. A set should be viewed as an ADT and the implementation shouldn't matter.
> I think the reason why c++ doesn't make a good language to teach youngsters is because stl is still a beast of a template library, still spits out garbage error messages and is painful to work with even by the most experienced of developers (25+ c/c++ here)
STL is a beast, yes, but you don't have to know the whole of it. Regarding error messages, I find clang's error messages better.
> Don't get me wrong, I love c and c++, but i'd rather teach some python or ruby because they can get stuff done and working and not struggle with tedious syntax.
I would teach Python as well. I was taking exception to the knee jerk reaction to C++.
I meant "not as useful" as "not as efficient". Of course you could do everything you could do in Python (or whatever) in C++, since Python is basically a subset of C++ (I assume Python is written in C/C++).
It just seems weird to make beginners start with a complicated tool when there are easier tools that can get the same results.
Useful in what sense? Are you _using_ an operating system? What language was that written in? So how useful is it?
NB: I'm taking your comments to apply equally to C as C++, given the prevalence of C in operating systems. If you really would not have said the same thing about C, I retract my comments.
I think you can program the Arduino in C/C++ (like every other Microcontroller), but I was under the impression that it actually has a Java Runtime and the usual way is to code Arduino programs in Java.
The Arduino is based around Atmel's 8 bit AVR architecture which really doesn't have what it takes to run a JVM. The ATmega328P which the Arduino Uno board uses has 32KB of code space and 2KB of SRAM which isn't really enough for something like Java. The normal way Arduino projects are built is by defining a "setup" function and a "loop" function which, when compiled, are actually just called by a hidden C++ file with a main function that essentially does this:
