I "grew up" in the 80s with computers that barely worked. It took hours of fiddling with jumpers and IRQ settings to get simple CGA programs to run (not to mention copy). Even in the 90s in college, to play the fun games (xtank, hunt, muds) I had to compile them myself - not always straightforward with the myriad exotic flavors of unix prevalent at the time. It was NOT "magic".
This is the experience that taught me how computers work. This is why was enraptured by Norton's _Inside The IBM PC_ when I was 14. Without the early struggle, I'd be just another clueless user waiting for the Acolytes of Steve Jobs to come down from the mountain with a new miracle.
Screw that. When you're young, it _should_ be a struggle. Kids shouldn't be able to take technology for granted, they should have to figure it out. If and when I have kids, I'm going to make sure that their technology breaks at regular intervals and if they want to keep playing Super Mario 18, they're going to have to figure out how to fix it themselves.
All these problems you mention with Rasberry Pi make me think it is ideal for teaching children to program computers.
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I "grew up" in the 80s with computers that barely worked. It took hours of fiddling with jumpers and IRQ settings to get simple CGA programs to run (not to mention copy). Even in the 90s in college, to play the fun games (xtank, hunt, muds) I had to compile them myself - not always straightforward with the myriad exotic flavors of unix prevalent at the time. It was NOT "magic".
This is the experience that taught me how computers work. This is why was enraptured by Norton's _Inside The IBM PC_ when I was 14. Without the early struggle, I'd be just another clueless user waiting for the Acolytes of Steve Jobs to come down from the mountain with a new miracle.
Screw that. When you're young, it _should_ be a struggle. Kids shouldn't be able to take technology for granted, they should have to figure it out. If and when I have kids, I'm going to make sure that their technology breaks at regular intervals and if they want to keep playing Super Mario 18, they're going to have to figure out how to fix it themselves.
All these problems you mention with Rasberry Pi make me think it is ideal for teaching children to program computers.