[sf-lug] Teaching programming at SF-LUG meetings

[jim]

   definitely. 
   i'd be interested in meeting on a day 
different from a scheduled sf-lug meeting 
and at a different place, hopefully at 
different places so's to investigate 
alternative meeting locations. All of the 
previous suggestions, including St. 
Anthony's, are okay with me. 
   of course, including this at some part 
of a scheduled meeting, too, would be 
a good thing. 


On Thu, 2008-09-18 at 23:27 -0700, Asheesh Laroia wrote:
> There was some discussion earlier on this list about teaching introductory 
> programming.  Thinking about it, I would love to be more directly involved 
> in that sort of thing.
> 
> I would be thrilled if any non-zero number of people decide to follow 
> along.  There's a great book on the web called "Think Python: An 
> Introduction to Software Design" at 
> http://www.greenteapress.com/thinkpython/thinkpython.html .  It's a free 
> (of cost) download, and it's a Free Book (in the sense of the GNU Free 
> Documentation License, the same license Wikipedia uses).
> 
> There are about ten pages per chapter, plus exercises.  Maybe we can do 
> one chapter and exercise per SF-LUG meeting?  If someone's interested, 
> reply and I'll make sure to come to SF-LUG meetings with teaching you as 
> my carrot. (-:  But you have to promise to read the chapter before I talk 
> to you about that week's lesson.  Hopefully you'll even do the exercises, 
> too.
> 
> (Honestly, this is probably more useful than an intro programming course 
> at an online university, having just spent the past two hours trying to 
> tutor a generally smart person who is going through such a course.)
> 
> Anyone interested?  We'll work out details.  I could be convinced to do 
> this outside SF-LUG meetings if people really think that's a better idea. 
> (One reason to do that is to go faster, like one lesson per week.)
> 
> -- Asheesh.
> 
> P.S. If someone *really* wants Java or C++ instead, I can think about 
> that.  The Python version is more recently-updated, so pretend I never 
> said this.
> 
> P.P.S. Still thinking about this Debian packaging tutorial thing.  Working 
> on the announce. (-:
>