The author says the purpose of this book was to answer "what daddy does at work" so in that regard I don't think it's underwhelming. However, I can't help but think that adults (programmers) will enjoy this more than children. As a teaching book for programming it's quite underwhelming indeed!
I am a programmer but I have always been interested in the learning process and mentoring. So in recent year I have conducted some self-study on these topics. Now this is such an immense topic and I have surrendered to my ignorance on so many levels. But, from what I can tell, there is a lot of dogma that we trust blindly, a lot of great old ideas of course (Piaget, Dewey, etc) that have been a great influence but not enough (and simplifying an incredibly complex topic).
Some insights I've had that have made me realize how hard education is getting right (forgive the simplifying, but it needs to fit a HN comment)
* Children have many different ways of understanding and sense-making, but we have a very simplified/dogmatic view of how chilren learn.
* We seem to overemphasize practical activity at the expense of other ways of grasping meaning (e.g abstract thinking)
* We make false assumptions: "The absence of abstraction awarness or articulation of it is a sign that abstractions are not at work in their thinking"
* ...I could go on..
Barely scratching the surface I have realized how little I know. This is such an interesting topic and you can learn a lot studying the pioneers, Piaget, Montessori, etc. but always have a critical eye! More recent literature I can highly recommend the works of Kieran Egan.
Being an educator is incredibly rewarding but I think we as programmers need to be much more humble when approaching the teaching practice..
I am a programmer but I have always been interested in the learning process and mentoring. So in recent year I have conducted some self-study on these topics. Now this is such an immense topic and I have surrendered to my ignorance on so many levels. But, from what I can tell, there is a lot of dogma that we trust blindly, a lot of great old ideas of course (Piaget, Dewey, etc) that have been a great influence but not enough (and simplifying an incredibly complex topic).
Some insights I've had that have made me realize how hard education is getting right (forgive the simplifying, but it needs to fit a HN comment)
* Children have many different ways of understanding and sense-making, but we have a very simplified/dogmatic view of how chilren learn.
* We seem to overemphasize practical activity at the expense of other ways of grasping meaning (e.g abstract thinking)
* We make false assumptions: "The absence of abstraction awarness or articulation of it is a sign that abstractions are not at work in their thinking"
* ...I could go on..
Barely scratching the surface I have realized how little I know. This is such an interesting topic and you can learn a lot studying the pioneers, Piaget, Montessori, etc. but always have a critical eye! More recent literature I can highly recommend the works of Kieran Egan.
Being an educator is incredibly rewarding but I think we as programmers need to be much more humble when approaching the teaching practice..