>
> I like Learning Perl too, but I've actually found it useless for
> absolute beginners. I've taught a couple of courses to high schoolers
> who had no programming experience, and we always needed to start way way
> before the point Learning Perl starts at. For instance, many people
> don't know what variables are for, and simple statements like "$x = 7"
> aren't as obvious to absolute beginners as you might suspect. It
> encodes some subtle relationships about time relationships, assertions
> vs. imperatives vs. queries, and so on.
I thought of myself as and "absolute beginner", because I knew
absolutely no Perl. But I see the distinction you are making!
With no knowledge of Perl (or C, or C++ or Sed or AWK) I found
"Learning Perl" to be an excellent book for a self-study course in
Perl. But, I already had some knowledge of programming (e.g. Fortran
& Basic.)
On the other hand, Programming Perl is a frustrating to use when you
begin a course of self study. Even if you know some programming, the
book is not organized for a person who doesn't know any Perl. But now
that I know some Perl, Programming Perl is a much handier reference
than Learning Perl.
>
> Interestingly enough, "Elements of Programming With Perl" hasn't worked
> very well either, because it tries to teach general programming practice
> issues alongside beginning Perl techniques. I've found the students
> unready to deal with the former until they have more knowledge of the
> latter.
I agree that teaching general programming practice would interfere
with teaching high school students their first computer language. It
would particularly interfere with getting them to use and understand
variables. General programming practice should be covered fairly
early-- but not during the first few chapters of a book used to teach
the first programming course. Students won't get it.
>
I guess when someone asks, Where to Start, we need to know: Well,
exactly what do you know?
Lucia
