Exciting stuff, in my view - which once gain I became aware of by monitoring PlanetPython. This cite by Ned Batchelder
http://www.nedbatchelder.com/blog/ I would hope that folks will at least get as far as looking at the presentation: "From Nand to Tetris in 12 Steps" that is linked from Ned's site. Further exploration of the surrounding resources, authors, institutions involved in this effort I discover an educational approach that seems refreshingly 'reasonable', which doesn't sound like particularly high praise, though I mean it to be. Among other things: A very interesting effort to provide tools to teach the low-level view of using a high level language - a step which in my self-directed approached I skipped, but certainly not without consequences. "Lite" version, which might make an excellent early stage of a introductory cs course using Python - giving orientation a bit to the forest, before the look at the trees. http://www1.idc.ac.il/vic/ """ What is Vic? The Visual Computer (Vic) is an interactive simulation of a general-purpose digital computer. The objective of Vic is to walk the student through some of the most fundamental ideas underlying the design of modern computers. As a side effect of this tour, the student also gains a hands-on and friendly introduction to programming. In Vic, everything is done, taught, and illustrated through computer programs, written in the Vic language. This language has ten commands that can be mastered in just a few minutes. Yet behind this simplicity lies a great power: every program, written in any language, can be translated into an equivalent Vic program that produces precisely the same results. """ Not totally dissimilar - I think - in approach to GvRobot (and its successor) but with different lower level goals >From the same institute and author, the recently published "The Elements of Computing Systems: Building a Modern Computer From First Principles" http://www1.idc.ac.il/tecs/ which is more heavyweight, geared to CS and engineering students at the college level and graduate level. _______________________________________________ Edu-sig mailing list [email protected] http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/edu-sig
