Newsgroups: comp.lang.smalltalk
Path: cantaloupe.srv.cs.cmu.edu!das-news2.harvard.edu!news2.near.net!howland.reston.ans.net!torn!nott!cunews!chat!fdesjarl
From: fdesjarl@chat.carleton.ca (Frederic Desjarlais)
Subject: Re: Smalltalk in CS 1
Message-ID: <CzyD63.4q9@cunews.carleton.ca>
Sender: news@cunews.carleton.ca (News Administrator)
Organization: Carleton University
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.2 PL2]
References: <9410211433.AA13245@sci.brooklyn.cuny.edu> <1994Nov2.120152.7543@wavehh.hanse.de>
Date: Mon, 28 Nov 1994 00:54:02 GMT
Lines: 52

Martin Cracauer (cracauer@wavehh.hanse.de) wrote:
> Gerald Weiss 718-951-5945 <weiss@SCI.BROOKLYN.CUNY.EDU> writes:

> >The CS department at Brooklyn College is having an abstract discussion
> >concerning the language used in the intro programming course. One
> >opinion is that the majority of the world (translate to USA) is using
> >C in CS 1 with a small but growing number using C++. From Lalonde's
> >'Discovering Smalltalk' I know that he is using Smalltalk in CS 1, but
> >I was wondering if I could get some feedback from out there of other
> >institutions using Smalltalk for intro programming. Any editorializing
> >would be welcome as well.

> Bad choice, I think.

> CS students should learn the whole range of programming techniques
> and/or how high-level expressions are mapped to hardware.

> Smalltalk forces one style. Using different styles in Smalltalk means
> misusing the language. You'd better use a Lisp dialect (scheme) if you
> focus on giving an overview of high-level constructs or C if you focus
> on mapping to hardware. 

	As some of you may have noticed by reading Wilf Lalonde's book
Discovering Smalltalk, it is currently taught in CS1 at Carleton
University in Ottawa, Canada.

	I strongly agree using a language such as Smalltalk as a CS1
language since it starts students with writting in a OO minded way
right from the start.  I've used Pascal, Visual Basic, HyperTalk, etc
and etc before I came to this university, but never have I used a
language as OO as Smalltalk is.  The course is very well taught here. 

	Another good thing for using OO in CS1 classes is that
structured programming can still be used in writting methods in
Smalltalk.  Therefore one must still learn how to write in a
structured way but on top of that the programmer must remember to use
the OO facilities as well.  A few of my classmates have barely
programmed before and find Smalltalk "not as difficult as they
thought".

	I guess the key to it all is to have good profs to teach the
material.  Of course having Smalltalk experts here at Carleton U does
help a lot.  

Thanks for your time,

----------------------------------------------------------------------
Frederic Desjarlais		         APEX Software Engineering
Carleton University		         "The Pinnacle of Programming"	
Computer Science - Software		 No job too small... 
Email address: fdesjarl@chat.carleton.ca
----------------------------------------------------------------------
