Path: csiph.com!newsfeed.hal-mli.net!feeder3.hal-mli.net!newsfeed.hal-mli.net!feeder1.hal-mli.net!border3.nntp.dca.giganews.com!Xl.tags.giganews.com!border1.nntp.dca.giganews.com!nntp.giganews.com!local2.nntp.dca.giganews.com!nntp.earthlink.com!news.earthlink.com.POSTED!not-for-mail NNTP-Posting-Date: Thu, 19 Jul 2012 08:48:36 -0500 Date: Thu, 19 Jul 2012 06:48:40 -0700 From: Patricia Shanahan User-Agent: Thunderbird 1.5.0.2 (Windows/20060308) MIME-Version: 1.0 Newsgroups: comp.lang.java.programmer Subject: Re: teaching Java and formal grammars References: <2323c0cd-d843-460b-b39d-d14be0928eff@googlegroups.com> <5bvrv7l6m37aha6n3ri5giatrarpeb6boe@4ax.com> <80b9a66d-0b65-435b-adbb-3e61c83c6a54@googlegroups.com> In-Reply-To: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Message-ID: <3NGdnSdxL7SpjZXNnZ2dnUVZ_t2dnZ2d@earthlink.com> Lines: 28 X-Usenet-Provider: http://www.giganews.com NNTP-Posting-Host: 190.181.18.99 X-Trace: sv3-k9A4w8zzFJA0gY06wxYnQdwDYHxhmTkP1sgSS54fQAnUY7GHMtZU1Hw/rFTmyZTxymjP4TPrWI1DgtA!cQun234NHoXaqsQWl7JLPbVcOGU7xPrG3HLtiWC69AQFT7Ci2DILBfpNBfFBd2I8UFTj9ibDB9ww!auDwg7UuXgLKcUaG28Um5UDbGgPfqfJG+62bc+LKXJ9Nlg== X-Abuse-and-DMCA-Info: Please be sure to forward a copy of ALL headers X-Abuse-and-DMCA-Info: Otherwise we will be unable to process your complaint properly X-Postfilter: 1.3.40 X-Original-Bytes: 3273 Xref: csiph.com comp.lang.java.programmer:16105 Stefan Ram wrote: > Patricia Shanahan writes: >> That means there are teenagers trying to learn Java who have no idea >> what a formal grammar is, or how it works. > > In my first Java programming classes for a general audience at > an evening school for adults, I started out to teach EBNF first. > But now I have given up on this, because it confused the people. > Sometimes, EBNF productions were confused with Java source code > and were written into the program! But even if this would not > happen, it costs time to teach EBNF, which is then lacking for > Java in those relatively short-time classes. If I would have to > give classes with more than 100 hours, I might start to teach > EBNF first. But my classes usually have about 18 hours for the > beginner class (plus about 12 - 18 hours for an optional > continuation class, the »advanced course«). > I am not sure hours of instruction are the important thing for programming language learning. How much time are the students able and willing to spend outside class? I wonder whether the Java and EBNF could be taught in parallel without causing confusion. For example, teach enough Java to write a very simple application, then show a simplified extract of the Java grammar that is sufficient to derive the applications the students now know how to write. Patricia