[Edu-sig] re: promoting computer literacy through programming python

[Arthur]

John -

>I also ignored all the personal interactions ...

Yeah.  That would be the novel, not the dissertation.

But the beat goes on.

And as much as I enjoyed the dissertation (and I did) and I am disappointed
that one theme, advocated strenuously by one AS, was implicitly rejected
without analysis, evidence, or comment.

The "Disadvantages of Python" section includes both case sensitivity (with
some equivocation) and zero based list indexing. There is also discussion of
integer division with accepts in all respects the thinking that links the
issue as a significant barrier to entry for beginners.

My consistent position has been that these entry level barriers are
demonstrably trivial next to the true and significant barriers inherent in
the process of learning to program, as well expressed in Dethe's
"Programming is hard" quote introducing Chapter 2. 

The particular "barriers" under analysis can as well be seen to represent
aspects of a gentle introduction to the inherent uniqueness of the
programming milieu, as distinct from the natural language or mathematical
milieu.  The adjustment to which is a necessity. Remove all trivial
barriers, and we are only left with the significant ones.  There is a wall,
rather than a ramp leading over a wall.

My Zen on the issues, and nothing more.  But I feel strongly, and I think
there is enough merit to require some evidence, counter-argument to reject
out-of-hand in a study attempting some scientific grounding.

Art