On Wednesday, July 24, 2019 at 1:40:25 PM UTC-4, sk wrote: > > To riff on Will's message: > > In the Bootstrap:Algebra > <https://www.bootstrapworld.org/materials/algebra/> materials, we use > Racket syntax because it's a powerful pedagogic device. Recently, for > various reasons, we've ported this over to another language called Pyret > (while also maintaining the Racket version; it hasn't been deprecated). > > Pyret has an almost-traditional infix syntax. It turns out infix is > actually much worse for the concepts we try to teach in that curriculum. Of > course it can be done, but the irregularity of infix — which is barely > noticed or even appreciated in some contexts — is a real headache there. We > have to work against it, rather than it working for us. > > So, especially in education: > > (a) the subtleties of syntax are manifold and sometimes unexpected > > (b) there's an enduring value to our (beloved) syntax, so it'll never go > away (-: > > Shriram >
In our CS1 for humanities and social science the parenthetical syntax has not only not been a problem, it really appears far easier/better. As sk and other bootstrappers and htdpers have known for a long time, unless one focuses on already familiar numerical algebraic expressions, irregularity is a hindrance. I've taught the exact same material at the start of a 3rd year CS PL course, and the students there didn't find the syntax as easy as one would hope for students with that much CS “experience”. In fact, unsurprisingly, many find the syntax as hard as expected for having trained on very different syntaxes (especially when they are unclear about the semantics that were attached to those syntaxes). Although the switch to teaching the start of the course with literally the same materials, with the students knowing that, seems to have reduced resistance substantially (presumably they don't want to be seen as complaining about something 1st year humantities students are fine with). -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Racket Users" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to racket-users+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/racket-users/e615518f-4f81-4fae-bed1-2a221ebddc66%40googlegroups.com.
