Is it worth teaching our kids how to Code...?
A decade ago, there were several experts telling us that learning to code was a skill as vital as English and Maths.
And today many pupils are indeed taught how to code.
However, there is a problem: there is a glut of coders. Chat GPT among them!
Software developers are losing their jobs at a massive rate: last year there were over 250K lay offs in the global tech sector.
Many businesses have gone through the process of building their digital infrastructure and are now left with massive software teams they don't need.
Elon Musk, for example, can now run Twitter with a fraction of its former staff.
But it's not all about jobs!
I'm no coder, it's not really my natural skills set, I'm more of a touchy-feely qualitative and not-so-touchy-feely critical kind of guy.
HOWEVER, I have in the past tried to teach myself coding. Mainly a bit of Python. And I've got nowhere, but as a result of just TRYING, I have an appreciation of what's involved with coding, what lies behind the front-ends we use.
That alone I think is worth the effort and time investment.
And when it come to teaching English and Maths, MOST students will not excel at both, many will hate one of them, very few will become literary experts or maths prodigies, but having an understanding of how language and maths (is maths a language...?) work does help with understanding.
I mean obviously being able to read and do basic calculations helps in day to day life.
When it comes to coding, the skill may not help one daily, but it has an obvious synergy with maths, showing one how maths can be applied practically, that alone is maybe worth keeping coding on the syllabus.
And then of course there will still be a need for coding skills going forwards, even if it's just co-creating with chat GPT, for most people probably over the next decades.
I would say that early coding lessons would help develop the experts we'll need to develop serious deep software going forwards, but possibly these kind of people will be so naturally gifted anyway, they'd be able to DIY their pathways...?
Just a few thoughts on the matter in hand!
Posted Using InLeo Alpha
I do know in the Scottish IT sector and I presume, as there are a lot of banks headquartered up here that a lot of the development layoffs are due to outsourcing which is a bit kak. That and the new penchant within the industry to purchase off the shelf software and configure rather than develop their own which almost used to be the standard approach. I think this has been enabled by the adoption of cloud architecture and services.
Then chatgpt comes along and just exacerbates the whole shebang. I think it's a must have in this increasingly technical world but agree that fewer will become real coders
The thought of working in lower level IT and co-creating with chat gpt sounds awful, I think it's a useful skill so you know what's behind the systems you use, even just a little bit of knowledge, but learning enough to be able to create stuff to deadlines, that's gonna get grimmer and grimmer!
Honeslty with this AI thing i strugle to find or predict any job or tech trends .... like in 5 to 10 years creating digital things will be easy peasy ... if I need to make a wild guess I would say there will probably be something like short hypes in everything ... like songs comes and goes...
Therapy, of course there will be bots, but at the end of day people will pay to talk to a human just because of the connection!
Hey buddy. Just wanted to say thank you for the support you give to my posts. Is very much appreciated.
Will not forget that when I undelegate my HP!
Hey cheers, no worries!
Still valid, but now learning to code using Artificial Intelligence
I don't think there is any way around getting help!
Texas passed legislation that allows programming classes to substitute for higher maths to satisfy the requirements for graduation. Things are at least becoming interchangeable.
Personally, I found programming to be unhealthy for me. I would spend too many hours awake trying to get the damned things working. I decided to not pursue that line of work given that compulsion.
But in reality, it's a similar quality to learning maths. I found that there is a degree of meticulousness necessary to successfully solve problems. Any little error in notation throws you off, which taught me attention to detail. Fortunately for me, I was taking classes at a time when calculators (such as the TI-92) started to do algebra, trigonometry, and calculus. Now we have Wolfram Alpha. So, it's possible to get the answer so that you know what a successful solution looks like. Then it's just a matter of working until you arrive at the answer. More often than not, I had wrong answers due to sloppy work, which improved with time.
To this day, I could probably use some coding from time to time. I haven't needed to do any Algebra, Trigonometry, or Calculus. Fortunately, there are LLMs that can do basic coding. I know enough about coding that I can piece together something workable using an LLM the way I was able to cobble things together with my TI-92.
I agree RE maths, probably better just sticking to that, a bit of coding could help with motivation - to show how logic can build something concrete!
Congratulations @revisesociology! You have completed the following achievement on the Hive blockchain And have been rewarded with New badge(s)
You can view your badges on your board and compare yourself to others in the Ranking
If you no longer want to receive notifications, reply to this comment with the word
STOPTo answer the title: No.
My mathematics teacher said so (he also never allowed us to shorten the word mathematic); most mathematic education in school really is about how to express concepts and stuff in formula.
I believe in humanistic schooling and yes: School should not focus on job-skills. Those change. Programming languages change.
The way they taught us things was within a historical perspective/context.
First we learned about Thales of Milet, then Phytagoras and so on.
They taught us how it works, but also how we arrived there and from where.
So, if in the future there was a new invention or discovery, it could not throw me off balance.
If you just teach like: This is how things are - and then things change - You have taught the wrong thing.
That's why school should always happen on a chalkboard and pen + paper.
I never needed a calculator or computer for school. Until the last 2 years, where they also introduced computers. That was early enough.
The people who gravitate towards this stuff, would so anyways.
I taught myself programming to quite a high level. Thanks to my humanistic teachers, who gave me all the tools, it was pretty easy.
Btw: I think I also achieved quite a high level in English.
Physics and math were my favorite subjects, but my best grades were in German - And I hated English, and now it's my hobby - funny how that works, eh?
I even learned Latin, but never spoke a word of it. Yet, Latin classes furthered my education like nothing else did.
Imo school should not teach you any job skills, at all.
Sitting still, focusing on a thing - That helps with any task; discipline. Beyond that: School should be done from the humanistic angle, focus on a fine character and general understanding.
I am actually scared of focused education.
Imagine you teach someone only code, but no history, no geography, no art, no music.
You might create a monster.
John Locke is my hero.
I disagree with one thing.
Please switch me to a whiteboard instead of a chalkboard. While I do enjoy using a chalkboard when the chalk is good, I had to buy my own because the school only provided cheap chalk that was a pain to use and produced a lot of dust. Sorry, I'm ranting about chalk.....
I believe focused education has its place, but it should be reserved for the later years of high school, such as in vocational programs, and college. Creating well-rounded students offers them numerous benefits as they transition into adulthood.
As long as we agree that LED screens aren't necessary, but could be counter-productive, you can have a whiteboard. 🙂
I avoided using the term 'high school' - because the whole system is a bit different here in Germany. I went to a Gymnasium. That's 12-13 years of school. Then you choose a specialization and go to University. (Or don't)
The concept 'college' does not even exist here.
Whoops. I didn’t realize you were in Germany! LED screens are the bane of my existence in the classroom, especially since I work with young students (ages 4-6). Unfortunately, my school district requires them for various tasks.
My two kids at home hardly ever use them. All I’ve noticed from these LED screens are more tantrums, more fighting between them, and almost no interaction with them.
Children age 4-6 on screens is the opposite of schooling.
Hand-eye coordination - writing cursive for example - is important for the brain's development. Neuroscience pretty recently proved that it helps with memorizing vocabulary*. Isn't that amazing?
*my source for this
Quite the compliment. 😁
My accent would give it away, if we spoke, though.
I completely agree. In many places, the school systems are broken and don't prioritize the best interests of students.
I'm sure your English, even with an accent, is much better than my second language! Actually, I don’t even know if that’s your second language... It could be your third or fourth, lol!
It's quite grim, so many kids in the UK you see with their own large screens, portable ones just zoned out!
Agree RE whiteboards, much cleaner!
I generally agree, letting kids have a choice within reason with what they want to specialise in and then using their interests as a way to teach....
Curriculums should be broad too - language, maths, music, plenty of physical activity and outdoors stuff, also emotional resilience.
Agree 100% and teaching kids how to think critically and figure stuff out for themselves.
I do think coding can be a useful tool - showing kids how maths (basically) can help them build things.
Learning to code actually made it easier for me to solve problems and work things out.
It gave me an amazing creative outlet that let me build tangible things.
I think kids learning to code is great but only if they are actually interested in the subject.
I'm a hive witness supporting the blockchain please consider voting for me.
I find that people who learned coding basics over time with complex data structures and algorithms (and not using prefabricated code snippets) have a more structured mind, which can be useful sometimes in other domains, if they want to. Maybe it's a bias. Otherwise, for the job market, this may not be a smart choice to start learning coding now.
I think anything code related could be useful!
Things have changed so much from when I started programming. I didn't start until I was at upper school (at 13) and that was as a lunchtime 'club' thing dialling in from a single terminal to the local college. I didn't have my own computer for a while after that. I've managed to have a career around it anyway. I will probably retire in a few years and I wonder what changes will come by then.
I do think it is useful to have a little knowledge of how to program computers. There's lots of jobs where you can automate some of the work. I've done a fair bit of coding for fun, including around Hive stuff. We can access all this data to analyse the data.
I've not used 'AI' tools to actually write code for me, but I know others do. You have to understand what it is doing as it may get it wrong. Debugging is the really tricky part.
That's an interesting potted history of how you got into it! Back in the day, I never had the option at school - books for spectrum to programme games.
AI I think is going to be essential - probably great at spotting those typos!
School should focus on telling you multiple ways to make money not focus on a job just tell people how to make money the entire time bc that is all that matters from school why else go no one goes to not make money that really and a few essential things should be taught. Replacing the bs classes with money courses and how to make it various ways would end up with a lot more financially educated people not making mistakes that kill them.
Oh I am all for teaching financial literacy, for sure!