What Is Computational Thinking?
Overview
Computational Thinking (CT) has been articulated as a “fundamental skill for everyone, not just for computer scientists.” Almost all agree with the lofty goals of the initiative, to teach humanity the ability to see the world through the sharpened eyes of a computer scientist. However, what does it really mean to be a computational thinker? While it is helpful to see examples that show we’re already engaged in CT (e.g., using a backpack is pre-fetching and caching), it is perhaps more valuable to see everyday situations that are transformed when viewed through a computational thinker’s trained eyes (e.g., writing dates as YYYY-MM-DD so they’ll sort correctly). We hope to present enough examples to satisfy a growing chorus of those who need more grounding, using a unique delivery format.
SIGCSE '10
Abstract  |
Daniel D. Garcia  |
Colleen M. Lewis  |
John P. Dougherty  |
Matthew C. Jadud  |
| Jokes | Category | Author |
|---|---|---|
| You groaned during "Jurasic Park" when the line "Hey, I know this... It's UNIX" was uttered, because you realized it was actually IRIX. (Pop Culture, UNIX) | Pop culture | Matthew C. Judd |
| You thought the Bit from Tron was awesome. (pop culture, bitwise ops) | Pop culture | Matthew C. Judd |
| You think "Code Monkey" by Jonathan Coulton is a rock anthem of our generation. (Pop Culture, Industry) | Pop culture | Matthew C. Judd |
| You rooted for the computer in "War Games". (Pop Culture, AI) | Pop culture | Matthew C. Judd |
| You only attend conferences whose names are acronyms. (Culture) | Culture | Matthew C. Judd |
| You're still wondering who these "user" people are. (Usability, Culture) | Culture | Matthew C. Judd |
| You've made a purchase because you knew the software/hardware behind it was open source. (Open Source) | Culture | Matthew C. Judd |
| You think a paper titled "Computing Humor Considered Harmful: No Silver Bullet" is funny. (Titles, History) | Culture | Matthew C. Judd |
| You think it's odd that the trees that grow in nature are upside-down. | datastructures | Robert McCartney |
| It bothers you that the directions on your shampoo are "Lather. Rinse. Repeat." | algorithms/recursion | Robert McCartney |
| You think that the joke "There are 10 kinds of people in the world, those who understand binary numbers and those who don't," is funny. | math-y-ness/binary | Robert McCartney |
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