Richard Heathfield wrote:
Morning, chaps. This morning we're going to learn some lies. Sorry about
that, but it's come in from head office. Apparently we have to lie to you
first day out, so that several weeks from now we can have a good laugh at
your ignorance and teach you the truth. Except that'll be a lie too, either
because we're still not ready to teach you the truth or quite possibly
because we don't actually know it. Hey, where'd everybody go?
Telling students porkies is not the way to earn their trust.
A more accurate example would be the real stuff we learn at school.
As Terry Pratchet said, we have to first tell you small lies before we
can
get to the bigger truth. Without the small lies, comprehension is
almost
impossible, because the mind has to be comfortable with existing
concepts
before we can go on to more advanced concepts;
Example: in order to get the mind used to the concept of infinity
we are given (in primary school) the explanation of infinity as
stretching
out in two directions, without end.
Once our minds are able to grasp the concept of infinity *itself*, then
we can be told (in HS) that infinity does, in fact, come in different
sizes;
infinity, we finally learn, comes in an infinite number of sizes.
There are possibly better examples of where a small lie is needed to
get the student to understand, and once understanding is achieved
then the small lie can be discarded for the truth but I'm afraid I
cannot
think of any right now (press me for details later
. Small lies are
what all *good* teachers are able to use and discard when the time
comes. It is used to great effect all the time ...
We tell kids in PS why the sky is blue; at varsity they learn the real
reason.
We tell kids in HS how the bank calculates repayments on the house;
they
learn at varsity why their calculations in school never matched their
dads
bond repayment down to the last cent.
We tell children that pressing down on the accelerator supplies more
fuel
to the engine making it spin faster and thats how the car accelerates;
when
they become students at an automobile trade school they learn that
that is not the entire story.
Nevertheless, there is no excuse for "void main"
goose,
(I agree in principle with you on teaching programming, but I
also realise that other fields have long since used little
lies to temporarily defer the full explanation of a difficult
concept until the student is ready. The type of errors I
find in certain books, though, are not the type that are
usefull in this way)