You appear to be suggesting that there is some quality that people have or
don't have, in exactly equal measure across the population. This reminds
me of the notion of left brain or right brain domination. Are there equal
numbers of left brain and right brain dominated people in the population?
I undertand that it is rare to find people who are equally balanced?
Regards,
Shoaib Qureshi
Richard Bornat wrote:
> At 4:04 pm +0000 30/11/98, Alan Blackwell wrote:
> >> Executive summary: Students learning to program typically divide into two
> >> populations: those who can easily learn, and those who can't. Teaching
> >> techniques and curriculum innovation seem to have no effect. Are there any
> >> effective ways of testing student aptitude before entering the course?
> >
> >Richard,
> The evidence presented was from a PG course. Exactly the same phenomenon
> appears in UG courses. Our PG students are all non-programmers, bar one or
> two; there is absolutely no correlation with prior 'mathematical' courses
> such as engineering, chemistry or anti-correlation with non-maths ones like
> politics or language. If it were just a matter of experience, if we were
> seeing those with some background in the upper hump, and the others below,
> I wouldn't have bothered the community with my question. Regretfully,
> after twenty-five years of trying, I have to conclude that we must look
> elsewhere for an explanation.
>
> The middle students don't exist, at either PG or UG level. This isn't a
> matter of those who have learnt and those who have yet to learn, I'm sorry
> to have to tell you. The assumption that programming aptitude is normally
> distributed would have to have some pretty tremendous evidence to overcome
> the universal experience of programming teachers (and programmers'
> employers) that it definitely isn't normally distributed.
>
> Richard Bornat
--
Shoaib Qureshi, Rm C323, Software Engineering & Applications,
Philips Research Labs, Cross Oak Lane, Redhill, RH1 5HA, UK
Direct: +44 (0)1293 815489 Fax: +44 (0)1293 815500
