Don't Teach Coding
Until You Read This Book
1. Edition May 2020
288 Pages, Softcover
Wiley & Sons Ltd
Further versions
The definitive resource for understanding what coding is, designed for educators and parents
Even though the vast majority of teachers, parents, and students understand the importance of computer science in the 21st century, many struggle to find appropriate educational resources. Don't Teach Coding: Until You Read This Book fills a gap in current knowledge by explaining exactly what coding is and addressing why and how to teach the subject. Providing a historically grounded, philosophically sensitive description of computer coding, this book helps readers understand the best practices for teaching computer science to their students and their children.
The authors, experts in teaching computer sciences to students of all ages, offer practical insights on whether coding is a field for everyone, as opposed to a field reserved for specialists. This innovative book provides an overview of recent scientific research on how the brain learns coding, and features practical exercises that strengthen coding skills. Clear, straightforward chapters discuss a broad range of questions using principles of computer science, such as why we should teach students to code and is coding a science, engineering, technology, mathematics, or language? Helping readers understand the principles and issues of coding education, this book:
* Helps those with no previous background in computer science education understand the questions and debates within the field
* Explores the history of computer science education and its influence on the present
* Views teaching practices through a computational lens
* Addresses why many schools fail to teach computer science adequately
* Explains contemporary issues in computer science such as the language wars and trends that equate coding with essential life skills like reading and writing
Don't Teach Coding: Until You Read This Book is a valuable resource for K-12 educators in computer science education and parents wishing to understand the field to help chart their children's education path.
Acknowledgments xiii
Introduction 1
Who is This Book For? 3
Let's Do It! 3
Chapter 1: Prologues 5
A Wizard's Tale 5
The Sorting of Wizards 5
The Call to Action 10
A Language Without 10
Our Strange Protagonists 10
(cons 'Apple 'Soft) 13
Tower of Babel 15
Confessions 16
Penances 17
A Language Within 17
Installing Languages 17
Writing in Tongues 19
Kiss, Gift, Poison 20
Nova: Va o no va? 22
Hello, Hello, Hello 23
Languages Without 25
Tongueless Languages 27
Babbage's Calculus Club 29
Diffs 31
Finite Descriptions of the Infinite 31
Bottling the Human Will 33
Machines Anchor Language 35
Now That It's Out of Our System 39
Languages Within 40
Signed Languages 42
Silent Battles 43
Our Strange Citizens of Broca's Area 49
Chapter 2: Beginnings 51
A Wizard's Tale 51
The Leap of Faith 51
The Forge 53
They Slept 56
A Language Without 56
Syntax - Building Materials 59
A Meta-Linguistic Meander 60
Back to Syntax 62
Semantics: "When your eyes see this, do this with your mind . . . " 63
Checking Assumptions 65
We Have a "Language." Now What? 66
A Language Within 66
Cats 66
Stories and Back Stories 71
Ab(stract) 74
Shortest Path: Dijkstra to You 75
A Brave New Syntax 79
Languages Without 81
The Unwritten, Unwritable Backstory 83
Three Old Friends: Language, Math, Algorithms 84
Algorithms of Antiquity 88
A Brief Story of Stories 90
Languages Within 91
Foreign Language: A Friend, Perhaps a Mentor 96
Zapping Broca's Area 97
More Monkey Business 98
Chapter 3: Middles 101
A Wizard's Tale 101
Purgatory 101
Descent 103
Ascent 105
A Language Without 106
(Stories (Within Stories)) 106
Order Word 111
Easing the Transition 113
Magic Tricks 114
A Language Within 122
Implicit Learning 122
Animation 122
Napoleon's Risky Maneuver 126
Noughts and Crosses 131
Round Stories; Square Frames 132
Languages Without 133
Illusions of Mind 133
Dactylonomy: Digits to Digital 134
Externalization 137
The Spark of the Pascaline 139
The Best of all Possible Languages 141
Automatons 144
King Ludd 147
The Song for the Luddites 149
Languages Within 152
The Machine Within 152
Potions for the Mind 152
Science and Schools 154
Mindset 156
Metacognition 158
Deliberate Practice 160
Second Language
Acquisition 160
Krash Course 162
Fluency and Expertise 164
What It Feels Like to Upgrade Your Own Wetware 166
Meta-teaching 168
A Universal Educational Language 169
The Loop of Being Human 173
Chapter 4: Ends 175
A Wizard's Tale 176
Learn to Teach; Teach to Learn 176
Montage 178
Loop Back 183
The Beginning 184
A Language Without 184
Our Road Thus Far 184
Definitions 185
Becoming the Machine 187
Loops 188
Mad Libs 190
Turing Completeness 191
Ifs 196
Extending Language 199
A Language Within 200
So lernt man lernen: Der Weg zum Erfolg 200
Designing Your Deck 207
The System 210
Unburdening Yourself 213
Parting Exercises 214
Languages Without 215
The Flood and the Tower 215
Soft is the New Hard, and the Old Hard 216
Abstraction's Arrow 218
Languages Within 224
The Education Bottleneck 224
History's First Coding Students 225
(environment (mind (fluency))) 228
Co-Authoring the EdTech Story 233
Babbages and Lovelaces of Education 238
This Final Section Has No Name 240
Conclusion 241
Next Steps: Learning Sciences 241
Next Steps: Languages to Learn 242
Next Steps: Coding 242
Next Steps: Software Engineering 242
Next Steps: Hacker Culture 243
Next Steps: History 243
Naming Things: Computer Science 244
Naming Things: Philosophy of Mind 245
Naming Things: Learning Science 245
Thank You 246
Bibliography 247
Index 259
LINDSEY D. HANDLEY, PHD, is a teacher, researcher, entrepreneur, author, and co-founder, with Stephen Foster, of ThoughtSTEM and MetaCoders.org, which have helped hundreds of thousands of beginning coders. She is a passionate advocate of both using science to improve education and of improving the teaching of science worldwide.
