@abucci

As noted here https://librefaso.pollux.casa/sjbm2023_semaine6.gmi when using Gcompris' "programming labyrinth" to teach basic programming concepts (before teaching Scratch) to primary school kids, the main problem was indeed the function.
Some kids grasped it intuitively, but those who didn't were stuck completely and I wasn't able to help them.
Would you have advises on how to help them understand, in case I ever have another chance at such teachings ?

@futurebird

@futurebird

Also, when you post such interesting questions that will generate a lot of insightful answers, maybe you'd want to tag them ?
So that they can benefit other people...

@futurebird

There's a famous anecdote about Yachar Kemal, the uber-famous turkish author : one day when he was visiting the countryside, a shepherd¹ asked what was all the ruckus.
Another villager answered "you don't know ? the guy who wrote 'Memed, my hawk' is here, he's visiting !".
And the shepherd was completely puzzled :"but... nobody wrote 'Memed, my hawk' ?"
(in the sense of "it exists, it hasn't been created, and especially not by a mere human").

¹IIRC

@godofbiscuits

I wouldn't say exactly "it's your fault" but more "there is no hope".

@futurebird

Colonel Michel Goya (who's probably as evil as any professional soldier, and alas betrayed his father's Spanish Republican ideals, but who do think) explains in his book "Sous le feu" how not knowing what to do is completely debilitating in situations of stress, while if you give precise orders, even soldiers who are actively shot at will gather their spirits and do what they need to do, though they are still under fire.

5/5

@futurebird

I do have this gut-wrenching despair when something doesn't work in Godot, though, and it's not something I understand as a possible bug of my code but rather as some knowledge I'm lacking (Godot is great but also extremely rich, and I have only a grasp of its most basic functions); when I'm completely at a loss, in other words, when what I'm missing is out of my intellectual reach.

4/?

@futurebird

With software rather than hardware, I don't have this total distress when a bug makes a Python program I wrote not working (which is basically, anytime I write a Python program).
I'm not really proficient in Python, but I know how to debug. Painstakingly and not very efficiently, but at least I have an idea of how to proceed.

3/?

@futurebird

Like, I worked on a thermal captor and the hardware itself provided unreliable measures - there was nothing I could do about it and it threw all my project into the gutter.

I have the same inner and unsettling reaction when I press the button on my computer and for whatever reason, it doesn't power on.
If I get an error message, something I can understand and act upon, it's not the same. Maybe I'm still screwed if I can't fix it, but at least I understand what's wrong.

2/?

@futurebird

Not sure that I can qualify as a CS teacher (I only taught a few informal classes, mostly Scratch) but as a user I can relate.

There is some existential dread in having your basic tools not working without warning.
A bit like physicists in the three-body problem start despairing when physics starts to behave in an unpredictable way.

I have this when I work on Arduino and a thingy doesn't work as it should.

1/?