Last month – April 2022 – the NCTE (National Council of Teachers of English) published a position statement on Media Education in English Language Arts. https://ncte.org/statement/media_education/
The position statement is a very admirable document that touches on many societal issues that I hope to convey to my students in high school computer science. Computer science teachers should consider a similar or joint statement as education in computing media often overlaps with education in computer science.
However, there is one section of this document that mischaracterizes “computational languages” that I believe needs serious reconsideration:
Computational languages and power: All of the digital tools, platforms, and applications used by students and teachers are themselves composed of computer code written (most often) by companies. It is important for English educators to advance in our own critical awareness of how issues of power and inequity operate in the greatly invisible computational languages that comprise digital tools, platforms, and applications, especially as a small number of companies dominate our online activities and profit from the data we produce through online interactions.
The statement does not provide a more detailed description of a “computational language” or provide examples of how they promote inequity. An Internet search for “computational languages” reveals that the term has not been well-defined but generally refers to computer programming languages such as C++, Java, JavaScript, etc. In 2019, Stephen Wolfram defined a “computational language” as a language that “expresses things in a computational way – and for capturing computational ways of doing things” and used it to describe the Wolfram Language. But it is unclear whether this definition has reached critical mass.
While a few regrettable examples may exist, I struggle to see how “computational languages” such as C++. Java, Python, or the Wolfram Language by themselves promote inequity. The NCTE should rewrite this section in this otherwise laudable document so that the search for inequities focuses on digital tools, platforms, and applications rather than on the grammar of the “computational languages” used to create them.
I also believe that this is an opportunity for computer science teachers to work across the curriculum, demonstrate the relationship between computer science and other subjects, and promote K12 CS education. Imagine if the NCTE could modify its position statement to include a paragraph as follows:
We encourage students to learn computer languages such as (examples) and understand how to use these languages to create the digital tools, platforms, and applications used in society. Learning computer languages is like learning how to use English and other natural languages to write sentences, paragraphs, essays, and books. We want students to examine content written in English and other natural languages critically. We also want students to be able to critically examine the digital tools, platforms, and applications used in society and how issues of power and inequity operate within them.
Please get in touch with me if you are interested in advocating for these changes in the NCTE position statement. Please also let me know if you disagree with this approach.