Creative Computing: Why kids should learn logical programming

Gabriel Lechenco — Thu, 07 Feb 2019 13:34:28 +0000

In the last years, we have entered into an Artificial Intelligence and Automation Age. This future/present image has been the target of discussions and fears, since a lot of working classes will not exist anymore because of the automation of a large number of services. You can check out which jobs are more likely to disappear in Will Robots Take My Job? website.

However, if jobs will vanish we just have to create more jobs, right? The computers systems will take care of the simplest and repetitive areas, so we just have to move on to more complex and creatives one. Because, for most than the artificial intelligence evolves, it never will take our humanity for us.

But, for that happen we must prepare our children for a future where their creative and social skills will be more required than their skills for repetitive and massive tasks (that's the computer's domain). One way of doing that is to teach our kids logical programming with tools like Scratch. That way, the kids are able to solve a problem in many ways, using their logical skills in a ludic and funny exercise.

This strategy, together with others, can be able to prepare them for a future where these skills will be necessary. If you have another point of view or solution, please make a comment in the space below.

2018 Retrospective - Highlights of my personal developer year

Gabriel Lechenco — Fri, 04 Jan 2019 18:31:14 +0000

That's my first article here in Dev.to, what makes me write here was to force myself to journal my experiences as a Computer Engineering student and as a developer and to improve my English and writing skills. So, to my first text, I wanna to share with you the main achievements and events that I pass by in 2018.

LogiCat

First of all, I'm very glad that I and a couple of friends could create this project. The LogiCat is a project that introduces children to programming logic and teaches then how to make a program using the Scratch. Beyond that, the main objective was to assist the kids to develop creative and logical skills, as well as collaborate with each other. This work was made with kids between 7 and 9 years old over the year. On last week each double exhibit an own final project using the tools that were mentioned during the lessons.

My First Open Source Contribute

In 2018 I resolve to contribute to the Open Genius - COSMOS repository, which aims to be "your personal offline collection of every algorithm and data structure one will ever encounter and use in a lifetime". I get really nervous after make a Pull Request for they can merge my implementation of a Von Neumann Cellular automaton that I must confess, was a lot of fun to code. Then, I was very happy when I received a positive answer, support the community it's really great and I hope to do much more over soon.

Operation Rondon 2018

Particularly I love to engage with volunteer work, and in this year I have the opportunity of work for two weeks in the town of Sertaneja which a team of almost 20 college students in the Operation Rondon 2018. During this days we make workshops to introduce the local people to different subjects, like informatics concepts, programming logic with kids (I kind of short demonstration of the LogiCat), basic electricity, health-related topics, and many others. In addition to community cinema and interviews to rescue the local history.

This Operation was great to meet new peoples and to help those who are in a less favorable situation.

Home Automation Project

With my graduation coming to the final stretch, the projects begin to get more complex. In part, the professors ask for deeper research and more robust prototypes, and on the other hand, the students want to develop a good and practical system applying all the knowledge accumulated until now.

So, for one of my class, my group decide to implement a system capable to control the environment nearby with a common smartphone. With a NodeMCU in hands, the thingSpeak server and a bunch of hours building the circuit and the Android's interface the system was working reasonably well. This experience teaches me how to organize the development of a complex system and how to deal with the pressure of things not working the way they should.

Embraer's Interview

Even with everything that happens over 2018, the best experience was to travel to an industrial pole and been interviewed to an internship vacancy in one of the biggest national enterprises on the country and who develop and build planes which flying around the world.

This day was intense and incredible, since the 9-hours bus trip until the interview itself, which was simple and without those classic questions of the human resources. I was able to meet other developers who are also finishing their degree and looking for a job. This gave me inspiration and I was able to know the level of professionals that the market expects, certainly, I will be more prepared for my next interview.

2019

2018 was a really good year, and I expect 2019 will be even better. For this, as a new years resolution, I will focus this year on my weakness and improve my developers and logical skills as a whole. For this year I will:

Improve my English

Mainly my written skills, that's the reason why I am written this and the next texts.

Learn JavaScript

I realize that there is no escape for that. The actual developer world breath JS, so I have to learn how to code this until the end of the year.

Project Euler

To improve my logical and mathematics abilities I will start to solve challenges from the Project Euler and the HackerHank websites.

I think that's it, my first Dev.to article. Thanks for reading and feel invited to discuss and comment below.

DEV Community: Gabriel Lechenco