Coding in classrooms – lessons from Logo

I remember Logo – it was a little turtle that we used in primary school computing classes. We programmed it to move forward, turn, move forward, turn etc. The year ended and we moved on to other things – like woodwork.

logo_mit

The below article looks at lessons learned from the rollout of Logo in schools in the 1980s/1990s. How did it go from being the next big thing in education to a niche hope that faded quickly (except in Vietnam!). There is an immediate parallel in the contemporary push for coding in classrooms through initiatives such as Code.org, CodeClub, CoderDojo and CodeAcademy.

All Students Should Learn to Code. Right? Not So Fast (by Valerie Straus quoting Larry Cuban, May 2014) – LINK

“True believers” (ed: here Larry refers to tech converts and advocates) are seldom reflective so do not expect a glance backward at why Logo became virtually extinct failing to last beyond a few schools where children continue to program using Logo-derived languages (ed: i.e. Scratch, also from MIT). Why?

The reasons are instructive to current enthusiasts for coding:

  1. While the overall national context clearly favors technological expertise, Big Data, and 21st century skills like programming, the history of Logo showed clearly, that schools as institutions have lot to say about how any reform is put into practice. Traditional schools adapt reforms to meet institutional needs.
  2. Then and now, schools eager to teach coding , for the most part, catered to mostly white, middle- and upper-middle class students. They were (and are) boutique offerings.
  3. Then and now, most teachers were uninvolved in teaching Logo and had little incentive or interest in doing so. Ditto for coding.
  4. Then and now, Logo and coding depend upon the principle of transfer and the research supporting such confidence is lacking.