Learning to code is often presented as a solution to job market problems of the 21st century, but are students really learning the competencies they will need?
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Articles on Coding
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Today, we're hearing about a researcher who records birdsong, how tech changes music and why song might help address Indigenous language loss.
Toys and games that involve friends and family members are more than just fun: they can foster new skills, challenge children to work in a team and encourage thinking and idea development.
Consider, for a moment, these two statements from the “Ultimate Guide to Understanding Blockchain Smart Contracts” on a well known Blockchain website: 1) Traditional Contracts “Traditional physical contracts…
How the geek effect and a sexist games industry is putting girls off a career in computing.
If you’re creating an app for an iPad, then why not create it on an iPad too. Is Apple’s Swift move to do this just another step towards the end of the personal computer?
When we ditched high-school Latin we lost a great intellectual training. Here’s how to get it back without resorting to a dead language.
Too many girls are missing out on learning IT and computer programming skills that could serve them well in the future economy.
The influence of private interests in English schools is on the up.
The Government changed the curriculum in 2014 so that all school children would be taught coding, but two years on this is far from reality.
Hackathons are all the rage, but if the participants follow through on the results, they can be a powerful instrument for generating innovation.
A third of families living below poverty level access the Internet only through their phones. And young people from these families get access to few learning opportunities.
Turnbull has said his government is committed to being one “of the 21st century”. So what could that mean for education?
Computer coding should be thought of as teaching children another language. If they get the basics right at an early age, who knows where their new-found language skills can take them.
In a report released this week, the Foundation for Young Australians claims that up to 70% of young people are currently preparing for jobs that will no longer exist in the future.
Math isn’t prejudiced, goes the argument. But these arithmetic programs can learn bias from the data fed into them by human beings, leading to unfair treatment and discrimination.
Software freebies can help businesses grow, innovate and attract staff – assuming they’ve worked out how to protect against the dangers.
Teaching children to code with computers is only part of the challenge to preparing people for a career in the IT industry. But it can also do more harm that good in some cases.
If we want students to be well prepared for the 21st century, then we should be teaching coding in school.
A heavy focus of Bill Shorten’s budget reply speech was preparing for the future with science, technology, engineering and mathematics education. While this focus is a step in the right direction, the policies probably aren’t the right way to go about it.
Top contributors
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Educational Experiences team lead (Senior Lecturer), ANU School of Cybernetics, Australian National University
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ESRC Future Research Leader Fellow, The University of Edinburgh
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Richard Bean is a Friend of The Conversation.
Research Fellow, School of Information Technology and Electrical Engineering, The University of Queensland
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Visiting Fellow, Macquarie University Applied Finance Centre, Macquarie University
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Professor of Reading and Children’s Development, The Open University
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Professor, The University of Western Australia
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Senior Lecturer, The Open University
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Lecturer in Education, University of Stirling
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Emeritus Professor, University of Nottingham, (currently CEO and Senior Vice President of the PETRA Group), University of Nottingham
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Professor, School of Education, University of Southern Queensland
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Senior Research Fellow, Digital Media, Western Sydney University
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Postdoctoral Researcher, University of California, Irvine
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Associate Professor, Teacher Education, University of Technology Sydney
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Lecturer in Business IT & Logistics, RMIT University
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Lecturer in Computing, University of Stirling
