On Mar 13, 2006, at 15:18, Christopher Schmidt wrote:
So, although most of the computer related classes - Desktop Publishing,
Word Processing, etc. - were taught on relatively modern machines
running a recent windows version, the Computer Science courses were
taught on the oldest computers in the school (for student use anyway).
My high school taught Pascal on Z/80 machines running CPM when those
were 'out of date'. I think they'd still be fine for learning Pascal.
Heck, I learned assembly on a VIC 20 (3583 BYTES FREE) and the concepts
are still the same today. I'm still not convinced children ought to
jump straight into Java as their first language - it offers enough of a
library that you tend to do more engineering and less CS
(exponentiation built-in!).
If anyone has influence in high schools I recommend the ACSL:
http://www.acsl.org
as a good opportunity for learning CS in high school. I went to a tiny
high school in central NJ but we still managed to place in the top five
nationally for several years. A good teacher is essential (thanks,
Jack DeValue!).
As for job postings requiring Microsoft Word and Excel - in 1990 they
probably required WordStar and Lotus 1-2-3!
-Bill
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