G'day Danny,
On Sun, Jun 30, 2002 at 08:49:41AM -0500, Danny Faught wrote:
> I love the experiential approach to doing exercises. It translates
> pretty well to teaching leadership skills. But I'm struggling with how
> to incorporate the approach into technical training. Has anyone seen
> this done before for something as technical as perl training?
>
> I've thought about having people get up and take on the role of
> different perl operators, and pass data back and forth or something.
> But I haven't quite worked it out.
As part of Perl training, I'm afraid not. Experimenal training often
has a high time-requirement, and when I'm teaching Perl time is
usually at a premium.
I would occasionally take an experimental training approach when teaching
first-year computer science. Explaining recursion was an example that
immediately came to mind. A bunch of numbered cards and some willing
students was an excellent way to demonstrate recursion in action.
It was particularly useful because recursion was an oft-misunderstood
concept between students.
I've personally found experimental training much more useful in teaching
concepts (such as recursion, data structures, and so on) than syntax,
and language features. I find most people can grasp the concept of
a hash rather quickly (especially when compared to something like an
address book), but struggle when it comes to the syntax (%hash vs
$hash{element} vs @hash{@slice}).
Just my 2 bits,
Paul
--
Paul Fenwick <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> | http://perltraining.com.au/
Director of Training | Ph: +61 3 9354 6001
Perl Training Australia | Fax: +61 3 9354 2681
