[plt-scheme] Re: I/O therefore no local

On Mar 1, 6:45 pm, Matthias Felleisen <matth... at ccs.neu.edu> wrote:
> On Mar 1, 2010, at 12:57 PM, wooks wrote:
>
> > The design recipe is language agnostic, take that and you really need
> > the supporting environment and the language to be effective.
>
> True enough, but neither was intended for an 1970s-style curriculum so  
> you will find a lot of mismatches.
>

The main manifestation of the 70's style curriculum is the presumption
and emphasis on arrays and the unnecessary infiltration of i/o. To be
honest you'd get that in any imperative course. Picturing Programs and
HTDP between them cover these topics at the level of CS1 - which is
the level the course is pitched at.

The most glaring mismatch I've observed so far is in questions which
become too trivial or nonsensical when answered in scheme (eg write a
routine to insert an item at the front of a linked list). So the data
structures part of the course is being taught imperatively.

The overarching aims of the curriculum are to promote good design,
testing and documentation habits. The Design Recipe will stand my guys
in good stead on that front.