Is teaching programming with C++ the best way to introduce your students to computer science? What about the approaching switch to Java? Are the software and hardware costs becoming excessive? Is remaining with Basic, including Visual Basic, acceptable? Are there aspects of computer science that are being missed? What can be done about the gender gap? What will give your students the greatest advantage when they continue on into computer science or computer engineering in college?

UNL welcomes high school and community college teachers from Nebraska to participate in a workshop early this summer at which these questions will be answered, practical options presented, and continuing assistance be made available. There is a treasure trove of lesser known programming languages and supporting materials that is free, easy on the computer hardware support, and yet more useful than traditional languages for teaching the important concepts of computer science. Use of these programming languages is the focus of the workshop.

A sample of the languages and tools that will be examined is Forth (great for teaching about stacks and postfix notation), Lisp and its dialect Scheme (extremely simple syntax, functional programming paradigm, great for teaching about recursion), TeachScheme (an educational support system utilizing Scheme), Prolog (logic programming paradigm, great for teaching about forms of logic, logic resolution, and recursion), BlueJ (a GUI Java environment ideal for teaching class structures and object orientation).

Only a small part of the time will be devoted to studying these languages with their syntax. Most of the time will be available to examining how the breadth of computer science can be presented using these languages as tools. This breadth includes data representation, digital logic, computer organization, networks, algorithms, language structures, data structures, operating systems, computational theory, and much more.

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