[Edu-sig] Hello from a CS Teacher

[Randy Latimer]

Dustin - just wanted to say that I like your discussions.  I'm Randy
Latimer...I've been teaching computer science in high school since the
early 80's, Pascal for years, now C++ and some Java.  I looked at some
languages with alternative styles way back in the 80's - Lisp, Prolog,
Logo - taught them some in high school, but these languages didn't catch
on.  The AP College Board pretty much dictates the main language we teach.
I tried to introduce C++ in the early 90's, but it was too soon, the
college board didn't switch to C++ until 98 or so, and that's when the
high school curriculum moved from Pascal to C++.
  At what age do we introduce programming, and what language?...obviously
not a simple answer, depends who you talk to.  Rice Univ. has been working
on introducing Scheme, I think it's the same kind of thing as introducing
Python as an intro language.  I know Scheme/Lisp pretty well, new to
Python.
  Randy