Experiences/guidance on teaching Python as a first programming language

[Denis McMahon]

On Tue, 10 Dec 2013 20:35:47 -0500, Dennis Lee Bieber wrote:

> On Tue, 10 Dec 2013 18:25:48 +1300, Gregory Ewing
> <greg.ewing at canterbury.ac.nz> declaimed the following:

>>That's like saying that when teaching woodwork we shouldn't let people
>>use hammers, we should make them use rocks to bang nails in, because it
>>will make them better carpenters in the long run.

> 	NAILS????
> 	Nails were verboten in my high school wood working class...
> 	We used dowels and glue; chisels to carve dove-tails; etc.

We were allowed to use screws, but they had to be brass, not steel, we 
had to drill appropriate clearance and pilot holes, and countersink where 
appropriate.

And god help you if you deformed the slot in a brass screw head by over 
tightening - I think that may have been why they made us use brass ones 
only, so that such damage was easier to spot and more likely to happen.

And yes, I can dovetail, mortise and tenon, dowel etc etc etc.

-- 
Denis McMahon, denismfmcmahon at gmail.com