My grandmother was a wizard, she forged clothing out of thin air using nothing but string and metal thumb-cap, taught to her wordlessly by the ancient ones. When a fabric would tear, she knew all the methods to seamlessly patch it up again.
My father was a wizard, he built enchanted automatons that could carry and go using metal implements, learned from reading ancient texts. When an automaton would break, he knew how to diagnose the problem and jerryrig a solution with existing parts.
I'm a wizard, I cast elaborate spells on cursed devices to funnel digital analogs of ancient texts into knowledge, learned from reading and responding to ethereal texts floating in the daedric plains. When a device gets corrupted, I know how to rescue it with the right enchantments and fortify it against further temptation.
My daughter will be a wizard, she will cast simple but powerful spells on the ever-present aeric cubes that will shape her reality, as learned by being raised by the voiceless ones who contain the sum total of all knowledge.
I've noticed that the younger generations have almost entirely been raised with Tablets, which are largely do-it-for-me devices. They don't have to troubleshoot or fix any issues, and the device takes care of sorting and organizing files and apps. Many of them have never used a mouse & keyboard, and rely on touchscreen interaction.
The prevalence of chromebooks in schools is another factor. While it has a keyboard and it's common for them to use an external mouse, there is no file system that some website pretending to have a file system.
Both Chromebook's and tablets break the fundamental rule of preparing children for the real work. There are few professions, if any that work solely off tablets and chromebooks.
I think millennials have a very special position. We grew up with computers but it was during the rougher times. So they had to learn more about how things worked. Then came the easier stuff (smartphones, etc.). So we are mostly digital native but with more depth.
Late Generation X and early Millenials oftentimes had to type of basic code of a magazine, if we wanted to play a game. :) Whole different level of insight. Tbf, we were a minority.
Looked like this (this is a short demo, some games where dozens of pages long): https://atariprojects.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/MadMagProgram1-1024x668.jpg
Gen X was the generation who grew up with illustrated children's books teaching assembly language programming. There was a window of maybe 10 years when it was not unreasonable for a bright kid to teach themselves the machine language of their home computer, as well as its entire memory map and how to control its video/audio circuitry by writing bytes to specific numbered addresses. Then Wintel PCs became the standard and that world disappeared.
Just a quick reminder that generation alpha is at most 15 years old.
yes, and at 15 I was well on my way to becoming a competent programmer. At 15, not knowing what a c drive is, is bad
Expecting everyone to know that is pretty stupid though.
Of course someone that likes programming interacts more with computers.
It's quite easy to grow up without ever using a windows PC. If their school computer was a Mac or an iPad or course they won't know windows specific things.
Can confirm. I taught a college freshman CS class last year. The keeds didn't know what files or folders were.
I've heard this from other educators as well! What do you think the ramifications are down the line with people knowing less and less about how computers actually function?
I mean, I guess mechanics have jobs because most people know how to use a gas pedal and steering wheel, but not how an internal combustion engine works?
What's an internal combustion engine? But seriously, this is pretty worrying. People will just consume whatever is put before them and not care about where it comes from or who controls it.
Does grade school not have a standard computer class any more? Growing up I had one every year of middle school and later elementary school, and often had classes moved to the computer lab for coursework in highschool.
My freshman CS class would give 15 minutes to correct a program submitted for grading if it leaked memory or crashed. After that you get a zero on the assignment.
Does your program have a method for weeding out people who aren't ready? It's not fair to drag down everyone else while you explain core concepts they should already be familiar with before enrolling.
touches every laptop screen, tv, monitor.... "the touch screen is broken" "what's a keyboard and mouse?"
In 20 years, we search for the arc of vim
