Re: presentable Java features and programs
On 4/6/2015 9:35 PM, Eric Sosman wrote:
On 4/6/2015 9:24 PM, Arne Vajh?j wrote:
On 4/6/2015 9:20 PM, Eric Sosman wrote:
On 4/6/2015 6:50 PM, Stefan Ram wrote:
A Java course participant asked me near the start of the
beginner's course: ?What can one do with Java? Could you
show me three Java programs??.
"What can one do with Java? Nothing that can't be done in some
other language. I'll give you a referral to our COBOL professor, or
to a guidance counsellor if you'd like to change your major."
What can one do with a hammer? One can build, or one can
destroy. The building may be shoddy, and the destruction may be
incomplete -- these depend on the circumstances and on the talent
and application of the hammerer -- but basically, that's It.
In short: Silly question. Something along the lines of "Why
Java as opposed to SNOBOL?" might have been more worthy, but ...
Long time since you were a student?
:-)
It can be very motivating to show some examples of real
world stuff instead of the traditional hello world
examples.
Yeah, well, okay. BUT!!! Why is this person taking your class
in the first place? What motivated him to spend a beautiful sunny
Spring afternoon learning about generics instead of romancing another
(non-)student of the gender he prefers? If the student is in your
class under duress, I sincerely doubt you'll seduce him with a load
of code he's not yet learned to read.
It is rare that motivation can be impressed on someone from without,
and rarer still that such an "alien heat" turns out to be a Good Thing.
People usually start to learn programming because they want to write
programs.
And then they find out that they need to learn a ton of stuff where
the examples typical are very far from the type of program they
want to write.
To keep them motivated then showing them that what they are learning
are all small pieces of a large puzzle that will enable them achieve
their goal can be a very good thing.
It is very natural for students to wonder whether what they are
learning is something useful out in the real world.
Arne