{"id":201,"date":"2009-09-06T11:50:51","date_gmt":"2009-09-06T10:50:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/mik\/?p=201"},"modified":"2020-05-15T15:45:59","modified_gmt":"2020-05-15T15:45:59","slug":"a-light-in-the-darkness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/proged\/2009\/09\/06\/a-light-in-the-darkness\/","title":{"rendered":"A Light In The Darkness"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-208 alignright\" src=\"http:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/proged\/wp-content\/blogs.dir\/192\/files\/2009\/09\/light.jpg\" alt=\"light\" width=\"360\" height=\"280\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/proged\/files\/2009\/09\/light.jpg 360w, https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/proged\/files\/2009\/09\/light-300x233.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 360px) 100vw, 360px\" \/>Computing education in schools is in a dire state\u2014we have known that for some time now.<\/p>\n<p>Over the last couple of years, reports came out thick and fast stating that school age students <a href=\"http:\/\/www.itpro.co.uk\/603945\/students-think-it-is-boring\">find computing boring<\/a>, that <a href=\"http:\/\/www.itpro.co.uk\/614179\/ict-and-computing-a-levels-continue-to-slide\">fewer students<\/a> are <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cphc.ac.uk\/docs\/reports\/cphc-itlabourmarket.pdf\">taking computing classes<\/a>, that offerings of computer science in schools <a href=\"http:\/\/www.csta.acm.org\/Research\/sub\/Projects\/ResearchFiles\/CSTASurvey05-07_09Comp.pdf\">is declining<\/a>, and that this is \u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.itpro.co.uk\/115179\/knowledge-economy-is-uks-future-says-report\">leading to<\/a> a severe\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.cphc.ac.uk\/docs\/reports\/cphc-itlabourmarket.pdf\">skills shortage<\/a>. All seemed to indicate that students are really not interested in programming anymore.<\/p>\n<p>Then today I stumbled upon <a href=\"http:\/\/www.edge.co.uk\/news\/gcse-students-disinterested-in-exams\">this report<\/a> of a survey of UK GCSE school students. (For the non-Brits: the GCSE is a set of tests that students take at the age of about 16.) And the result: Many students want more programming!<\/p>\n<p>Quote:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>Most students (63 per cent) said they would have liked more subjects to choose from. Topping the wish list for school based learning is computer programming voted for by almost a quarter (22 per cent).<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>So it&#8217;s not the students who are losing interest at all. It is just that computing in schools has gone so off track that it is actively turning the kids away.\u00a0Lets go out and get programming back into schools!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Computing education in schools is in a dire state\u2014we have known that for some time now. Over the last couple of years, reports came out thick and fast stating that school age students find computing boring, that fewer students are &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/proged\/2009\/09\/06\/a-light-in-the-darkness\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":179,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[86,107],"class_list":["post-201","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-teaching","tag-programming-education","tag-teaching"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/proged\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/proged\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/proged\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/proged\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/179"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/proged\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=201"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/proged\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1036,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/proged\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201\/revisions\/1036"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/proged\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=201"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/proged\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=201"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/proged\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=201"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}