High school computer prog. w/C++ and Alice

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We were just helping our sophomore-aged son sign up for classes for junior year, and thank HEAVENS he has decided to give up Band and take our suggestion to sign up for a computer programming class instead. He's never been all that interested in band (he just liked the social aspect, surprisingly enough), and we were thinking that the computer programming class might be smaller and have more nerdy kids like him -- which could be even better for him socially.

Anyways, the programming language they are using is C++, and the software is Alice.

Would love to know your opinions on the language and software they will be using -- if you think it's a good choice for beginners, and a useful thing for him to learn.

If band is a right now positive, please be open if you son starts to change his mind between now and August and wants to go back into band.

With C++, where it really developed power was with different looping. And where it really danced was using the random number generator to address questions in probability. For example, if a basketball player shoots 47% from the field, what's the chance he will have a relative dry streak of 0, 1, or 2 buckets out of the next ten shoots?

And something you didn't ask about, on jobs, I generally find the "easy" jobs hard and the "hard" jobs easy and I'll be happy to explain what I mean by that.

PS I AM NOT A PARENT. I am a person who has lived life on the spectrum and I try and be a pretty good guy.

Thanks so much for your answer! And yes, we will remain open to the idea of my son continuing on with band if he changes his mind in the summer. We had actually brought up the idea of a computer programming class to him, then realized that it would coincide with band. We said "Well, I guess you'll just have to not take the programming class" and it was OUR SON'S idea to drop band in favor of the programming class -- which came as a great surprise to us.

And yes, any insight you can give us into jobs and future possibilities or snags would be very much appreciated!! !

Which programming language is your first isn't a huge deal, and although I don't think C++ is quite the best choice for it, my first language was BASIC, which is definitely worse. C++ is based on C, and you can write C programs in C++, but it is very different in some ways, and bolts on a lot of new features. There's a common joke that if C is a dog, then C++ is an octopus made by nailing extra legs on a dog.

I haven't had a lot of experience with it, but it has some good low-level stuff from C, and the STL is supposed to make certain types of abstract programming easy. It is a bit less popular than it used to be, but is still used quite a bit, so it's easy to find books on it. Bjarne Stroustrup (who created C++) wrote a book on it that's pretty good. I don't like a lot of the design decisions in C++, but the guy is obviously smart and writes pretty well.

C++ is a rather big language, and so relatively few people try to use the whole thing at once, but instead some subset of it. So if your son doesn't end up knowing every single detail or obscure corner case in the language, that's not something to be ashamed of, it's normal. How you use a language is more important than how much you know about that language.

There seems to be a fairly strong divide between people who like computer programming and find it easy, and those who don't. If your son likes it, he will probably figure this out pretty quickly.

perhaps introduce him to codeacademy.com before the school starts, not as a mandatory thing but it does give a very quick very easy introduction to the concepts behind programming.
its interactive like khan academy so it will even tell you where and what you are doing wrong and how to correct it if he asks.

only reason i bring it up is that i found c++ to be utter nonsense untill i understood the basic tenets of programming and most of it carries from one language to the other, getting him acquainted with java definately wont huurt, that as said is if he is interested in it, this form of learning loses all power once interest vanes.

my 2 random cents

Any reason your son can't become one of the top cardiologists on the Eastern Seaboard?

And I know you'll love him either way and you shouldn't push him to go into medicine, just like you shouldn't push him to go into any particular career. But I do like the idea of 're-ambition-izing' ourselves from time to time, and the world can certainly push us down.

Now, my parents esp. my Mom pushed me on the science fair, something I enjoyed also. My mother is standing there holding one of my awards absolutely basking and beaming. I didn't like that picture. Only years and years later did it occur to me, it's not about achieving solitary success and standing there basking in a flat, one-dimensional way (and I also had fantasies of conducting a symphony and putting down my baton to huge applause). It's really about building a team, being a member of a team, participating in a team. That is a far more dynamic process.

Okay, so your son likes the social aspect of band. I have also enjoyed staffing a table at political events. And I did well with clients working at H&R Block, including underlining in blue ink the part of the bank product documents that I thought were particular dicey. It's an unethical company, but it was significantly less unethical with me working there. I'm very glad I took that chance. 3 years out of 4 (including another tax place), things worked okay. 1 year out of 4, I was fired (of course for other stated reasons). Okay, sure, sorry the world's that way. But my main loyalty was to my clients and my direct, immediate co-workers, and not so much to the company hierarchy.

The social exchange was perhaps structured enough that it made sense and I could observed what worked and what didn't. For example, I learned to be very brief with simply and directly asking "Presidential election fund?" and then moving on, because I had to save time for the more complicated stuff to explain. If you were a client, you would have been lucky to get me as your preparer.

So, your son might do better where's there's some direct contact with clients and the general public. And not just holed up in some corporate headquarters where it's all infighting and politics. (One reason medicine's good, actual contact with real patients and pretty measurable whether you're successful or not.)

That said, working at a grocery store was one of my worse jobs because the "managers" (cough, cough) were absentee and allowed bullying at the front. Working at a department store Christmas 2010-11, I was moved between commission suits and shoes. Well, how do you think commission sales people are going to feel about having new Christmas help taking away their sales? Not too good. This guy is in the department on his day off in street clothes talking crap. This other guy gets right in my face and literally points his finger, "When I give you a task assignment . . . " I said, "Son, you are not my boss . . . [pause] You know I'm going to have to talk to someone about this." I talked with the main assistant manager. He initially said, "Well, I don't think Daniel* has any supervisory authority at all . . . " But in that same discussion, he asked if I stole sales. He said, "I feel like there's something you're not telling me." Later that day, he came down to the department and as he walked away, he said, "You have your work cut out for you." Weird. Bizarre. I think even someone with excellent social skills would have trouble negotiating this situation. I probably should have folded the hand at that point. I finished my shift. My next day off, I called my department manager. She gasped when I first told her that Daniel* got right in my face and said, "When I give you . . " But then when I talked to her the day after that, she said, "Commission sales people are territory." I went down and talked with the human resource lady. She was somewhat distant, somewhat disengaged, maybe medium helpful. The people at shoes also don't like me, because I'm a new employee taking 'their' sales. Look to criticize, if the department has any straightening issues, the heck with sales. The guy talking crap on his day off asks me to help clean the dressing room, I try and be a good sport and help out. He tells the department manager that I left clothes on the shelf behind the register, i.e, telling a trickster lie to try and bring me down. The guy puts his hands on my shoulders in a oneupsmanship manuver to move me away from "his" register. I tell myself, next time, I'm not going to go along. A week or two later, he puts his hands on my shoulders, I resist, he pushes harder, I go along. A longtime lady in shoes wants me to ring her up with her discount coupons. Thats' fine. But then she wants me to void her sale, ring her up in a special way, as she stands over my shoulder. No, I'm not going to do it. No, I'm not going to do something complicated which I don't understand. She stalks off to complain to the manager, all this during her actual work shift. It's expected that we keep coupons at the registers for the benefit of customers. This is technically against the rules. I read on the Internet this company often uses accusations of dishonesty to fire employees.

Point being, let your son quit a crappy job.

If you find yourself saying, 'Need to stick it out,' 'need to hold onto a job' or any of the hundreds of other things in wide currency, try and take a deep breath and recovery.

I've also worked in a truly professional sales environment and did pretty well. Again, for me, the "easy" jobs tend to be hard, and the "hard" jobs easy. As a generalization, that's pretty accurate.

Now, I found attending a large state college from 1982-84 that dorm life had more physical bullying than high school (but less than junior high). Straight up, I recommend boxing classes. I recommend the strategy of tight, defensive boxing to a draw. http://www.wrongplanet.net/postt134616.html Because you're not trying to humiliate someone you're likely to see again. And if you happen to "win," accept it easily in stride and don't brag. And hopefully the zen of it, if you're prepared, a physical altercation actually becomes less likely. Mainly just some individual lessons and then practicing on your own. Please don't let your son take a bunch of blows to the head during training because all that stuff about post-concussion syndrome, and even cumulative lesser blows, is largely true. And just like football helmets don't really protect, presumably neither does boxing headgear.

Or, your son might enjoy general law, be in the top 20% of practitioners for his area, help a lot of people, and have plenty of colleagues, sure, why not? If he's interested in that, or business, or architecture, etc, or computers.

I don't think the choice of programming language is really what will make or break a programming class. If he's "nerdy" as you say he may well enjoy it. To answer your question, though, I know nothing about Alice, but C++ strikes me as an odd choice of first language. It's quite "hardcore" - very powerful, but also complex and can be very frustrating to learn. It takes at least 5 years to really master it - and that's coming from my former manager and mentor, who was quite an expert at it. That's not to say your son won't successfully learn it and become a pro at it, only to say that I think there are easier ways to achieve it. I'd say Python is a great first language - it just makes programming fun again, but is still powerful and very productive (ie. you can get a lot done in it in a short amount of time). It's the sort of thing that would really encourage someone new to keep going and keep learning. C# is another good choice, especially for someone who did want to learn C++ later as it's much closer to it than Python.

Back him up on whatever he's interested in doing even if you're worried it won't go anywhere. He knows best.

Try to only intervene if there's a problem It will all work out.

Vague advice, I know.