I share your frustration. I have been programming, and have taught, in various languages for about 30 years. (Getting old) I started on a TI-99 writing a word processor in Basic. Each language that I mastered left me thinking that there has to be something better. With each progression of languages I have seen improvements and mistakes. Languages that use different definitions of the same keyword are a good example of a mistake. The elimination of the GOTO statement was an improvement. (The elimination of the GOTO is largely due to the teaching proper programming technique.)

My teaching career was about 4 years long. It was all part-time at night, to help pay the bills. My first thought was that I could teach anyone to code. It is easy. And it is, when you start with a language that is designed for teaching. Pascal is one of those languages. (Pascal was originally never meant to be used in a production environment.) What I learned was that you have to teach the intent of programming before teaching the language. (Remove the mundane task from the end user.) Your example of 5 things first example brought back memories of the first day of class for new students of C/C++/Java. I just resolved that the first day would be this: explain the each piece of “Hello World.”, send them to the lab to do it themselves, and be available to answer questions of the students that really did want to learn a language.

In the end, each language has three parts, a way to store, a way to compare, and a way to get really loopy.

Education has not changed much. I suspected most of my professors to be shady.

question? Were their rights to privacy violated when video of them walking down the street was used to track them down? Was there a way for them to opt out of being photographed? God help us clear the idiots out of congress.

Sounds like someone does not want an alternate idea introduced to students. I think the same arguments were made for a flat earth.

Faith in nothing will lead you to believe that nothing exists.

I agree. It is about location. However, the "experiment" exploding shows poor supervision and judgment of the student. Expelling the student was reactionary response by an overly cautious school policy. As for this being a race issue. You would have to be looking at the color of your own skin in order to draw that kind of conclusion.

I am sorry to here about Shawn Woolley killing himself. However, he did not die because of the game. He died because he killed himself.

Yes, the game is addictive. However, demanding a warning label on a game is not an act of a sane person either. How many people have ever read the disclaimer on a piece of software? (Lawyers do not count.) Would watching several movies each night also be considered addictive? What about watching days of "wall to wall" coverage of thousands of people killed when two buildings are attacked in New York City? Should we demand a warning label for these addictions?

Forget about the warning labels and pay attention to the warning signs. Shawn was mentally unstable. His psychologist knew that about him. He killed himself by using a gun. Was there a warning label on the gun? So put a warning label was put on everything in the world. Would Shawn still be alive today?

For those who play the game, remember the only thing real about the game is the people behind the character. These people can befriend, help or hurt your feelings. Play the game only when it is fun and have fun in the real world.

The world we live in has many choices. Everyone has a life to live. We begin to make our choices in life when we become adults. Mrs. Woolley, your son made a choice that most people consider to be a bad one. He was an adult.