Objectives and Object Oriented Programming

After decades of experience, the computer education community has settled upon a relatively standard way of teaching procedural programming. With the growing use of object-oriented languages, the question is whether new wa ys are required. Some in the community argue that object-oriented programming languages are an extension of the 3GL approach, and students should still be taught the 3GL way first, even if students are using an object-oriented language. On the other hand, the “objects early ” proponents argue for radical change. As with most debates, the points raised by both sides contain implicit assumptions. Our real differences of opinion are at a more abstract level: our teaching objectives. This paper describes my experiences in trying to make teaching objectives more explicit, within the domain of object-oriented programming. First, I discuss PigWorld, a micro-world for teaching programming that blends “objects-early” with a traditional emphasis on algorithms. Second, I describe my use of Bloom’s taxonomy to make my assessment objectives more explicit. Finally, I look beyond introductory programming, to describe how an explicit acknowledgement of objectives clarifies the debate on whether the teaching of data structures needs to change if we teach “objects early”