Marc Prensky has a new drum.
Programming: The New Literacy
I believe the single skill that will, above all others, distinguish a literate person is programming literacy, the ability to make digital technology do whatever, within the possible one wants it to do — to bend digital technology to one’s needs, purposes, and will, just as in the present we bend words and images. Some call this skill human-machine interaction; some call it procedural literacy. Others just call it programming.
As a long time programmer, I’m not sure how much I buy into this definition of programming. One of the issues I have is that there’s not *a* programming skill. While it’s true that Excel Macro Language, BASIC, Bourne shell scripting, C, Fortran, and python all have a certain commonality, there are levels of abstraction and limits on access inherent in each device.
We talk about “programming a vcr” but that’s not, at least in my definition, programming. It’s knowing which settings to set. While a certain amount of that knowledge does constitute “programming” as well, the limitations on abstraction — the idea that you can get the device to do something OTHER than record a program at a certain time — make this exercise in programming the moral equivalent of turning the little dial on your toaster to make the resulting output more or less dark.
Yes, the vcr example is more complicated, but the end result is not actually varied.
In the article he admits that by “programming” he is really referring to the ability to follow menu prompts on devices but he does get into the idea that creating content in Flash is “programming” … which is an interesting and, frankly, arbitrary distinction on content creation. I won’t argue that Flash is an interesting tool. I have several issues with the tool itself - not the least of which is that creation in that medium has a substantial cost threshhold to participation. But why Flash? Why not Photoshop? Or Word? Those tools are likewise complex, complicated, and require a level of knowledge, insight, and abstraction that is equal to Flash. They also have huge barriers to production, limiting access to the relatively well-to-do.
I particularly liked his comment near the end where he discusses how to inculcate this notion into classrooms:
Can we do it by bringing working programmers into the schools? Not likely. Most of the good ones are busy programming and have no desire to teach.
I suppose I’m not one “of the good ones” because while I am very busy programming, I very much want to teach. Unfortunately, the only way I can teach is to teach at the university level because the barriers to my entry into the K-12 classroom are too high. And that’s with a PhD in Educational Technology.
Discuss.
Is programming a literacy? Is it THE literacy? Is programming anything more than specialized language? Does knowing which button on your cell phone takes the picture contribute to your literacy? Or has Prensky — father of the Digital Natives — once more taken a position that’s too simplistic to have relevance?
February 5th, 2008 at 12:04 pm
Not simplistic, but perhaps overly tech-centered. What he’s saying about programming concerns two things that can be found elsewhere: (a) the ability to read and follow instructions (i.e., plain vanilla Literacy) and (b) an understanding of processes combined with the courage to initiate or alter them (which any cook who doctors a recipe can tell you about).
This isn’t primarily a tech issue. It follows from more basic issues. Or perhaps we can say that high-tech thinking is merely an extension of low-tech thinking, which is more important. And that supports your motto above: technology is neither the problem nor the solution, merely the extension of factors that may themselves be either one.
February 6th, 2008 at 12:45 pm
His definition of programming sounds to me what someone in any field. Using Michael’s comment as a reference, the ability to read and follow instructions sounds like we would do when we first enter the field of study. We follow the procedures, watch them play out, and learn from them in our reflection. But, over time the second part comes into play where we start to notice the flaws in the procedures and alter them to make them better.
I don’t think I agree with his idea of literacy. Literacy can come in different forms and saying that being literate in one field doesn’t make you literate in another. Sure, the 21st century is here and we would all like to be literate in the skills of today, but it is not a universal thing. Just because I can use Flash doesn’t mean I can speak 5 languages. Maybe I’m taking this too literally, but one thing is for certain: literacy comes on multiple levels and cannot be narrowed to mastering one skill.
February 7th, 2008 at 9:29 am
[...] Dr. Lowell’s post, Programming: The New Literacy, (http://durandus.com/phaedrus/2008/02/05/programming-the-new-literacy/) he discusses his thoughts and views regarding a post he found by Marc Prensky where Marc states [...]
February 7th, 2008 at 5:27 pm
I would say that programming (however you define it) is not that important of a skill. The skill of greater importance (which programming is something of a subset of) is problem solving. I think that problem solving is the most important skill. I agree with the comment above that being able to read and understand what is read is also very important. Both are skills that programming utilizes along with logic and common sense, but programming is too specific a skill to be truly THE test of literacy.
On a side note, I was in a computer science program for two years before switching to mathematics and then getting a teaching degree on top of that. So, when a parent called me the other day and asked me if she could bring in her daughter’s calculator and get me to “program” it, my first thought was, “program it to do what?” Then, I realized that she really just wanted me to reset the settings.
I’m not sure how I feel about this tendency to say that making your VCR (or DVR in today’s world) record a specific show is not programming. I believe that programming is making a piece of electronics do what you want it to do. Sometimes that takes pages of code and sometimes it takes a few pushes of a button, but it all takes some logical (machine) thinking along with some problem solving and probably some reading of a manual (the DVR manual or the C++ Bible).
February 7th, 2008 at 9:33 pm
I think that Pensky needs to be a little more exact with his terminology. When I think of programming I think of the old way of using a computer before windows like Dos. When everything you did had to be written in command form or in programming language. I don’t consider being able to use menu’s programing. I think that it is more just the era you grew up in. If you want to tape something you had to learn to use your VCR. I can use imovie and iDVD on my computer, does that make me a programmer? . . . I don’t think so. So I just think programmer was the wrong term to use since it is associated with a higher level of computer technology use. Maybe activist might work better since you actively engaged with your technology.
February 9th, 2008 at 10:35 pm
If you look up literacy it lists four things: the ability to read, write, to be educated, and cultured. If we look at literacy in only one area that contradicts its true meaning. In terms of technology you may be able to read, or write in a program, you may very well be educated to a high degree in it. However, you are only cultured when you have had refinement. This leads me to believe that you must have exposure to more than one area. A higher enlightment if you will. So no I do not believe that programming is THE literacy. I do believe that it can be something that you are literate in and to varying degrees.
And in response to whether programming by knowing what buttons to push is truly being literate, let’s compare it to our basic language system. To be literate in language you must be able to read and write, be educated and cultured. (Albeit most schools lack in the last areas they do try in most occasions. ) In order to write you must start with the beginning blocks, the alphabet. Could we not consider these the buttons we push to get a desired outcome? If we combine the letters in just the right manner do we not get some sort of response? Although this would be considered literacy in its infancy it is a start. The same I feel for programming. In order for me to even begin to understand I have to start somewhere. Just knowing how to get my own email address is a start to understanding a more complex system. One of which I can decide if I want to venture into more, or less, just as students do when they learn just enough to get by and function or get more into it and become educated and cultured.
February 10th, 2008 at 1:04 pm
Programming literacy is one of many types of literacy, but it is definitely not “THE” literacy. Without the ability to read and write, one cannot achieve other types of literacy, like computer literacy. It is important to know how to operate devices that we use, and I think of it much like operating an appliance, like a microwave or blender. Current devices just have more steps to make it work.
Prensky brings out the point that educators need to prepare students to function in this technological world. I liked one of the replies to this article, which was let the kids teach each other. Many of our kids already do this, so what we need to do is channel this as educators to encourage our kids to be independent (and interdependent) thinkers.
February 10th, 2008 at 3:30 pm
I think programming is one kind of literacy, but just because one may not know how to program doesn’t mean they are illiterate. I have a brother-in-law who retired from IBM and he programmed computers, built them, etc…so I will have to admit that I do not know how to program, and I don’t know if I want to learn at this point when I have the help of a programmer. I guess if I didn’t have this help then I would need to now these things…..but how am I going to learn all of this….I mean, to me in terms of digital literacy there is all the programs that Dr. Lowell mentioned which are a lot.
I have another brother-in-law who can do all kinds of different things on his cell phone that I don’t know how to do—yet (and I’m not trying very hard right now), but it would take him an hour to change the margins in a Word document, so I do think there are different skill levels and different kinds of digital literacy.
February 11th, 2008 at 12:59 am
I think programming is also just another form of literacy. You first have to learn how recognize what symbols are like the alphabet or numbers and so on until you can understand and apply them. Programming isn’t the “LITERACY”, but it will probably be essential in the future.