It was last May that the BBC unveiled an ambitious plan to give a million schoolchildren a tiny device designed to inspire them to get coding. Now, after a few bumps in the road, the Micro Bits are finally ending up in the hands of children.
The tiny device can be plugged into a computer and programmed to do all sorts of cool stuff, and Year Seven pupils across the UK are being told it is theirs to take home.
Some, who have had early access to the Micro Bit, have come up with amazing projects - like the Yorkshire school that sent one up 32km (20 miles) on a balloon bringing back pictures of its journey to the fringes of space.
But, amid all the excitement from the young people getting a new toy, this is where the serious stuff starts. Big claims have been made for how this project can change the way children learn about and engage with technology. Now, it's up to teachers to make that happen.
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Media captionRishworth School sent a Micro Bit into the stratosphere
I've been talking to two people with different perspectives on the Micro Bit. Steve Hodges is a Microsoft engineer who was closely involved in the design of the device and Drew Buddie is head of computing at a girls' school and chairman of NAACE, an educational technology association.
Steve told me that his whole career in computing had started as a result of the BBC Micro in the 1980s.
"I begged my parents to buy me one for home. I told them I would never ask for anything again if they bought me a BBC Micro!" he recalls.
Another case of old people thinking they understand current technology. 99.999% of these things will never be used. Most of the rest will be tinkered with for a few days and forgotten. Anyone who is really interested in becoming a software developer will already have found a way to get their own machine. This is just another case of the BBC trying to justify its existence. That they went with their own branded product instead of the Raspberry Pi or a compatible shows just how much the BBC wants this to a marketing win for them.
> gives computers to school kids that can't pass english grammar yet
> expects them to understand computer grammars
you should seriously require a license @ 21 years of age to own a computer since it's technically munitions and has a bunch of export bans
these people are idiots
>>53627049
The thing that everyone seems to be missing is the ease of the programming language. I learned to program in BASIC when I was seven/eight around 2003. I was fortunate enough that my dad had an ancient DOS laptop in the basement, and just so happened to bring home an old course set from Intel about the learning computer or something. Because that machine had BASIC, I learned to love programming and the basics very quickly. People say that Python or C or Java or VB is easy to learn, but it's really not when compared to BASIC. You tend to get bogged down in syntax with other languages, whereas in BASIC you can hammer out code at the pace of a kid's attention span. There's 'languages' like Squeak or Scratch, but they're very limited and can get boring fast. Getting kids into programming doesn't require fancy hardware or blinking lights. It needs a modern version of BASIC.
And not VB either. You may as well just shoot the kid.
>>53628040
The powers that be are obsessed with pushing down the labor costs in the IT market. They keep trying anything they can to magically create more programmers. That's what all the special programs for girls, blacks, prisoners, and every other minority group are for. They really REALLY want it to be true that white males have been hogging all the jobs (Asians somehow don't exist to these people except when they're deciding on expanding visas). So they'll keep on dumping money into these gimmicks and the result is always the same: a very small percentage of people who would have learned programming on their own become programmers, the rest give up after they discover programming isn't as fun as using programs. It's not the evil white patriarchy keeping the rest of the population from being interested in programming, it programming itself that's keep interest low.
>It's meant to be programmed via a website designed by Microsoft, rather than connected to a keyboard and screen.
Wait, so this free "computer" requires another computer and an internet connection to be programmed? Why not just program things on the actual computer instead of on the free computer?
>>53628225
you're forgetting the real reason:
getting grant money for minority programs is very profitable
where I live, the corrupt city of chicago, we have an organization that gets 2.3 million a year in tax money to waste on ineffective programs that do absolutely nothing, but it's cool because whitey gets a kick-back for selling out his race. it gets a select few paid. it's a welfare program. no one actually _cares_ that minorities get technology. hell, throwing computers at them actually makes them dumber, so there's that. plus you get to hire some white guy you know to teach the course that will split the 'profits' with you.
thinking about this in terms of racist ideology and SJW conspiracies isn't what it is truly about. it's about ' i want to get paid today, let's get free tax money '
>>53628225
>muh special skills
the powers at be don't want an entire generation of unemployed, unproductive and bored people that are otherwise employed today at fast food restaurants. I guess they think we'll all be making video games for each other or something.
>>53628334
Like most of these types of programs, there's no follow up to determine if they're successful or not. They just keep going until the grant money runs out and then start up a "new" initiative which then gets funded in the name of diversity and fighting oppression.
>>53627049
People shouldn't program until they have at least A level knowledge of mathematics, describing procedures formally requires knowledge of formal systems.
These children should understand what a function is, what a graph is and what recursion is at the very least, before they start. The former is going to be taught loosely, however the latter 2, though understandable to someone of that age will be ignored, or at most taught in such a manner that they are merely able to parrot their definitions.
>>53628803
Can you imagine what a pain it will be to clean up the code generated by these monkeys? And if you complain about how terrible their output is, you'll be branded a bigot. They'll coast through life, producing shit code while those with actual coding skills will be doomed to acting as code janitors.
>>53628850
Please, they'll forget it as soon as they leave school, be completely uninterested due to equally uninterested and ill-informed staff and never work with a computer outside of baby-mode again.
>>53627049
It's just another way to sell a bunch of devices and make money.
They could make games running on a Game Boy emulator and miss on absolutely nothing.
>>53628920
Yeah, and they'll claim programming is easy so their job as Assistant to the Associate Regional Program Director at United Social Cause for Empowering the Disadvantaged should pay as much as software development.
>UK turns down funding for Raspberry Pi singleboard computers
>BBC immediately shits this out
>>53628297
Because that wouldn't be dependent on Microsoft, or easy to use at all. :^)
Comments on social media about this has been mostly "The US is too stupid to do this. Free computers not war!"
This thing has a retail value of about ten dollars. Anyone who isn't willing to spend ten dollars on their child wasn't going to raise a successful kid anyway. Doesn't matter if the government gives these away for free or not. But they get to look like they're doing something important, which is what's really important for them.
>>53629927
Will the zero fit in an altoids tin? Thats all I really want
>>53628334
I'll gladly make video games, but they'll run on 8-bit computer. The newer shit don't interest me. It's all overcomplicated, unfun junk.
>>53629927
Out of date picture
>>53627963
>computer grammars
>it's technically munitions
yes, because you are a master of the English language, as your post has just demonstrated.
>>53629804
>turns
its a complete betrayal
>>53627049
>to give a million schoolchildren a tiny device designed to inspire them to get coding
Just what we need. A million more inept coders.
Look up "wage compression". You are living it.
>>53631795
>this anon gets it
What we have:
* Wage compression.
* Countless bugs.
* Countless security holes.
* Absolutely shit tier performance.
* Absolutely shit tier memory efficiency.
* Nothing fucking works like it's supposed to.
You can thank:
* India.
* Aimless college grads who just realized their Master's in African pottery studies will never get them out of the basement.
* Mommy/grrrl/supermodel "coder" movement.
* And every single fucking school teacher who thinks "everyone should code!"
I want "everyone should teach" to become a meme because our current crop of teachers is shit. Rather then study a wide range of careers so they can help their students they get caught up in stupid fads and bubbles. Nursing is another place they shove every single student they can whether or not that student has the interest and aptitude to succeed.
>the big black cock micro bit
what the fuck
>>53628850
Already live it. I want to work at a place where being able to code in C and assembler is a requirement. Not because I think everything should be in C or assembler, but because that help separates the wheat from the chaff.
>>53628920
Some will forget. Some will flood a market that already suffers from poor differentiation. (Pointy haired management can't tell a genius coder from a baby coder.)
>>53629128
This to. "Programming is so easy, I did it in 7th grade!"
>>53632110
The worst is when some pointy head boss claims to be able to program due to some scripting he did when taking animation classes at the Art Institute. Of course they're never willing to roll up their sleeves and do actual work. I get the hell out of those companies as quickly as possible.
>>53627963
Kim Jong Un detected.
>>53633107
We do it for engineers. Of course writing jquery for some clickbait blog isn't the same as designing a bridge but there is plenty of software that can be highly damaging if written poorly.
the rishworth school space thing seemed pretty good .. kudos to the teacher for not being a boring fuck
when i was at school i.t. was just databases and office..
thrill a minute
>>53627049
The pi has ended up the plaything of adult hobbyists. Why will this be any different.
>>53628225
It offends me whenever I see a "Woman can code too" advert; Yes, we know woman can code, it's not as if the women who are damn fine programmers had to overcome some sort of disability to do so. I've always wondered how competent women in the field deal with this kind of crap; knowing that to speak out against these initiatives which make a mockery of their own achievements would be social suicide.
The message we should be passing on is that anyone can code if they have the patience and are prepared to work at it and that it is incredibly satisfying and rewarding. Throwing these expectations at children and demanding they git gud because some feminist shithead wants to prove that women are better than men is going to ruin these kids chances of ever discovering the joy of doing if for their own pleasure.
>>53634003
When there isn't a significant rise in the number of female programmers, they'll just continue to blame men. They'd rather run men out of software development than have there be a gender imbalance so if they have to ruin the entire IT field to make "equality" happen, they will.
>>53627963
BBBC license or Big Brother Computer license.
All your base code are belong to us.
>>53634542
BBC
>I fell for the cherry keyboard meme
>>53634003
We should just make a bunch of babies can code ads.
So it's an arduino with a proprietary connector?
>>53634570
Dogs can code to!
>>53627049
honestly, I respect the people behind GridWorld more than I respect this project
>>53630020
hope you got a heatsink for that CPU
>>53633206
This. Just look what happened in Brussles because Apple couldn't even get in their own phone
>>53627049
>Yet another raspberry pi/arduino clone
When will they learn?
