Programming should take pride of place in our schools

If we change the way ICT is designed and taught, we close the door on the future of our children

Therefore, in the immortal words of Rory Cellan-Jones, BBC technology, encryption (ie, computer programming) is "the new America." This was the title on his blog on the emerging campaign to stimulate the teaching of computer skills in schools in the UK.

dedicated readers will recall that it is also a bee in the bonnet of this columnist in particular. ICT (information and communication) curriculum in our schools has been a national embarrassment when I remember. This is because ICT effectively combines the "office work" and generally winds of training to use Microsoft Office when you really need ICT

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On said that preparing for a world in which Microsoft (and maybe even Google) is a little more than historical curiosities and PowerPoint presentations will be as Dead Sea Scrolls.

Rory Cellan-Jones

after the blog was prompted by signs that the campaign to rethink education ICT is growing. He first gave impetus to a report by two former from around the world of computer games, Ian Livingstone and Alex Hope, the need to transform the UK in the center "of talent and a world leader video games, visual effects industry. "The report recommends, among other things, that information should be part of the national curriculum.

• The campaign was motivated more by the news that a range of technology companies and the media - like Google, Microsoft, Sony, Nintendo, Sega, Electronic Arts, Activision, Talk Talk and The Guardian Media Group - have been supporting these recommendations.
• The government's response to all this long talk about it, but there is no commitment. HMG, gushing, "recognizes that the current ICT is not sufficiently rigorous and in need of reform" and "committed to the introduction of a streamlined, more focused and more rigorous." Yes, sir the Minister. But, he continues: "In the case of ICT is no national program, attention should always be given to children can learn computer skills that the government will work with industry to find the best way to do.. "Translation:" .. Sorry, the experts in ICT technology will probably be removed (because there is no room for him in the new curriculum, lighter), but we will find a way to sweeten the pill "

What is missing on both sides of this campaign is a real appreciation of the importance of introducing children to programming. Mr Livingstone and hopes to have an instrumental view of the matter, which is understandable given his employment history. They fear that British universities are not producing graduates with the skills that your industry needs now. They see the decline in students applying to UCAS for places in computer courses to 16,500 in 2003 to 13,600 last year and are concerned about their impact on existing businesses.

But somehow they make the same mistake as those who saw ICT as a means of preparing children for the workforce through training in the use of Microsoft Office - that is, the design of a curriculum by looking in a mirror. What we need to do is to give children the ability to operate in - and perhaps help create - industries that no one has dreamed of

What governments do not seem to understand is that the software is the closest thing to magic we have yet invented. It is pure "material mind" - which means allowing gifted and intelligent people to create something wonderful to us. All you need to change the world is the imagination, the ability to programming and cheap access to a PC. You do not need capital resources, materials or permission of an adult. Tim Berners-Lee and a small group of colleagues created the website nothing more than the vision and programming skills. A teenager named Shawn Fanning created Napster gifted - and led to the revolution of file sharing - while sitting in his room for six months and writing code. All you need to put Mark Zuckerberg launched Facebook was a laptop, your programming skills early and thousand dollars borrowed from a friend. And so -. Thanks to eBay and Amazon and Google, Blogger, Twitter and YouTube and countless other companies that have changed the world built from computer programs

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