The definitive resource for understanding what coding is, designed for educators and parents

Even though the vast majority of teachers, parents, and students understand the importance of computer science in the 21st century, many struggle to find appropriate educational resources.Don't Teach Coding: Until You Read This Bookfills a gap in current knowledge by explaining exactly what coding is and addressing why and how to teach the subject. Providing a historically grounded, philosophically sensitive description of computer coding, this book helps readers understand the best practices for teaching computer science to their students and their children.

The authors, experts in teaching computer sciences to students of all ages, offer practical insights on whether coding is a field for everyone, as opposed to a field reserved for specialists. This innovative book provides an overview of recent scientific research on how the brain learns coding, and features practical exercises that strengthen coding skills. Clear, straightforward chapters discuss a broad range of questions using principles of computer science, such aswhy we should teach students to code andis coding a science, engineering, technology, mathematics, or language? Helping readers understand the principles and issues of coding education, this book:

Don't Teach Coding: Until You Read This Bookis a valuable resource for K-12 educators in computer science education and parents wishing to understand the field to help chart their childrens education path.

STEPHEN R. FOSTER, PHD, is a researcher, author, and co-founder of several social enterprises with a mission to teach teachers how to teach coding. An expert in video game end-user programming and computer science education, Stephen has coded to generate peer-reviewed scientific results, coded to build educational technology solutions for teachers and students, and coded to bootstrap educational startups and non-profit organizations.

LINDSEY D. HANDLEY, PHD, is a teacher, researcher, entrepreneur, author, and co-founder, with Stephen Foster, of ThoughtSTEM and MetaCoders.org, which have helped hundreds of thousands of beginning coders. She is a passionate advocate of both using science to improve education and of improving the teaching of science worldwide.

About the Authors xi

Acknowledgments xiii

Introduction 1

Who is This Book For? 3

Lets Do It! 3

Chapter 1: Prologues 5

A Wizards Tale 5

The Sorting of Wizards 5

The Call to Action 10

A Language Without 10

Our Strange Protagonists 10

(cons 'Apple 'Soft) 13

Tower of Babel 15

Confessions 16

Penances 17

A Language Within 17

Installing Languages 17

Writing in Tongues 19

Kiss, Gift, Poison 20

Nova: Va o no va? 22

Hello, Hello, Hello 23

Languages Without 25

Tongueless Languages 27

Babbages Calculus Club 29

Diffs 31

Finite Descriptions of the Infinite 31

Bottling the Human Will 33

Machines Anchor Language 35

Now That Its Out of Our System 39

Languages Within 40

Signed Languages 42

Silent Battles 43

Our Strange Citizens of Brocas Area 49

Chapter 2: Beginnings 51

A Wizards Tale 51

The Leap of Faith 51

The Forge 53

They Slept 56

A Language Without 56

Syntax Building Materials 59

A Meta-Linguistic Meander 60

Back to Syntax 62

Semantics: When your eyes see this, do this with your mind . . . 63

Checking Assumptions 65

We Have a Language. Now What? 66

A Language Within 66

Cats 66

Stories and Back Stories 71

Ab(stract) 74

Shortest Path: Dijkstra to You 75

A Brave New Syntax 79

Languages Without 81

The Unwritten, Unwritable Backstory 83

Three Old Friends: Language, Math, Algorithms 84

Algorithms of Antiquity 88

A Brief Story of Stories 90

Languages Within 91

Foreign Language: A Friend, Perhaps a Mentor 96

Zapping Brocas Area 97

More Monkey Business 98

Chapter 3: Middles 101

A Wizards Tale 101

Purgatory 101

Descent 103

Ascent 105

A Language Without 106

(Stories (Within Stories)) 106

Order Word 111

Easing the Transition 113

Magic Tricks 114

A Language Within 122

Implicit Learning 122

Animation 122

Napoleons Risky Maneuver 126

Noughts and Crosses 131

Round Stories; Square Frames 132

Languages Without 133

Illusions of Mind 133

Dactylonomy: Digits to Digital 134

Externalization 137

The Spark of the Pascaline 139

The Best of all Possible Languages 141

Automatons 144

King Ludd 147

The Song for the Luddites 149

Languages Within 152

The Machine Within 152

Potions for the Mind 152

Science and Schools 154

Mindset 156

Metacognition 158

Deliberate Practice 160

Second Language

Acquisition 160

Krash Course 162

Fluency and Expertise 164

What It Feels Like to Upgrade Your Own Wetware 166

Meta-teaching 168

A Universal Educational Language 169

The Loop of Being Human 173

Chapter 4: Ends 175

A Wizards Tale 176

Learn to Teach; Teach to Learn 176

Montage 178

Loop Back 183

The Beginning 184

A Language Without 184

Our Road Thus Far 184

Definitions 185

Becoming the Machine 187

Loops 188

Mad Libs 190

Turing Completeness 191

Ifs 196

Extending Language 199

A Language Within 200

So lernt man lernen: Der Weg zum Erfolg 200

Designing Your Deck 207

The System 210

Unburdening Yourself 213

Parting Exercises 214

Languages Without 215

The Flood and the Tower 215

Soft is the New Hard, and the Old Hard 216

Abstractions Arrow 218

Languages Within 224

The Education Bottleneck 224

Historys First Coding Students 225

(environment (mind (fluency))) 228

Co-Authoring the EdTech Story 233

Babbages and Lovelaces of Education 238

This Final Section Has No Name 240

Conclusion 241

Next Steps: Learning Sciences 241

Next Steps: Languages to Learn 242

Next Steps: Coding 242

Next Steps: Software Engineering 242

Next Steps: Hacker Culture 243

Next Steps: History 243

Naming Things: Computer Science 244

Naming Things: Philosophy of Mind 245

Naming Things: Learning Science 245

Thank You 246

Bibliography 247

Index 259