Hello Hivians
How are you today? I hope we all are ok. In this post I would like to spill my thought about Coding, whether it is a skill or a need for us. This is a common question that most of us have got before, and I believe each of us have different point of view about this one.
I think it started from early millennial generation, the 2000 generation, you know that time people think everything will end because computer can not get into year 2000, because in 1999, most x86 Bios can only show year 99, so people believed everything would be reset to 00 and that's the armageddon.
Well Armageddon never happens... yet... and fast forward to nowadays...
Since that era till now, many people still believe that Coding and Programming will be the most vital and essential skill in 21st century. People take Coding as if it is the advance form of blending literacy with mathematics. Only some high IQ guy can do it, so people who do it.
Honestly I can't see that way regarding many IT guy are underpaid and the job seekers for IT industry are oversupplied, but let's not talk about that in this post, let's get back to the topic...
Regarding to the issue of people believing those things I have said above, some people think that coding should be introduced to children whether in school our as an extracurricular. This is where the issue arises and I believe everyone will have different opinion about this... Do you think coding should be a mandatory subject in the school curriculum, like mathematic or reading, for all children??
Digital Literacy
As this issue sometime arise everywhere, I think it is undeniable that coding or programming are considered important skills in nowadays era. So introducing these skills to children should not be that bad, indeed it is good... But it should be as introduction.
No matter how essential coding as a skill here, not all jobs are related with coding in fact only a few are related and need coding skills. As I have said before, the oversupply of IT educated people should solve this case and why would people get specialization in some mainstream skills that are oversupplied.
So I agree introducing how to learn coding or basic coding to all children as part of digital literacy, which allow people to have basic or fundamental understanding about how information technology is developed, distributed and implemented into our daily life and becomes indispensable part of our life.
However it is part as digital literacy, so children understand why and what it is, not as hard skill that taught and educated into children so they can code directly. Not everyone should be able to code or to do programming, but everyone should understand what coding and programming are, and how it is related to their life.
Skill VS Need
So after I talk a bit about digital literacy, then we now arrive at the main message I want to deliver here... Skill or Need? Sadly some people do not differ these two.
I do not agree if coding as a skill should be taught as part of school mandatory subject. This mean I do not think treating coding such as drawing, playing some musical instruments, or learning and speaking foreign languages.
Skill should be taught with some career-oriented approach, with clear goals and scopre. Student who take the subject or learn it should be able to enjoy it and really want to do or to build something with it.
So only for people who have deep interest that learn coding as a skill, same as learning guitar... not everyone must master guitar technique
What I want to see is teaching coding as a need, which I have said above as Digital literacy, it is like teaching children with basic math, an essential things that everyone should know. We do not have to teach children with differential equation or advance algebra, just the basic arithmetic.
By having some digital literacy, children will equip themselves with essential life skill by understanding how some app or program works. It will help them mastering the use of digital system with ease, such as phones, website, AI and many more.
Indirectly, people with better digital literacy will be wiser when they get tech issues like data privacy, misinformation, and automation... and eventually will be less likely to be scammed.
In this perspective, I believe everyone should learn the basics of coding, so they can be a good part in modern society, and the teaching is not addressed as a job skill to become programmers.
So what do you think? feel free to leave your comments below, and feel free to disagree with me here...
Thank you for coming and reading my post. I live in Jakarta, Ex-Capital City of Indonesia. Currently I am running a small business with 6 people. I used to live by making money online, that's why I like being here, on HIVE, and in #PIMP - (Paper In My Pocket) community.
