Name: Spreading the Feast Gathering
Start: 2025-07-11T00:00:00-05:00
End: 2025-07-12T23:59:59-05:00
Location: LaGrange, KY

Tagged: Computer skills, programming, software

This topic has 3 replies, 3 voices, and was last updated 12 years, 1 month ago by Lauren26.

Viewing 4 posts - 1 through 4 (of 4 total)

Author
Posts
May 1, 2013 at 9:11 pm
Lauren26
Participant
What do ya’ll do for teaching computer skills? How in depth do you go? I know in many public schools the kids now regularly use iPads so it’s important that our kids can use one too. Thoughts?
May 1, 2013 at 9:40 pm
Doug Smith
Keymaster
Don’t get too hung up on the specific technologies. For example, iPads are a hot thing right now, but there will be something else totally different by the time today’s kids begin college or career.
I would focus on being comfortable with computers in general and being familiar with common applications and tasks such as word proccessors, spreadsheets, e-mail, and web browsers. Kids should learn how to find things on the internet (and what to stay away from) and have at least some computer programming to learn those concepts and logical thinking.
Obviously, you can go deeper into various skills if there is interest.
May 2, 2013 at 5:19 pm
Tim
Participant
Just to add to what Doug said, if/when you get to the point where you want your children to get a little deeper understanding of how software works, you might want to check out this course by PluralSight.com:
http://pluralsight.com/training/Courses/Description/teaching-kids-programming
I haven’t gone through this particular course yet, but I am PluralSight customer and have found their courses (which are generally geared toward professionals) to be of high quality.
I think it is becoming more and more important for children to have at least a basic understanding of and appreciation for how software works given how much we interact with it in today’s world.
May 5, 2013 at 4:12 am
Lauren26
Participant
Thanks! I would actually like to take a Word, Excel, Powerpoint course myself since I don’t think I ever really learned them in the way I needed to feel proficient. I kinda just figured out how to get by with the computer skills that I knew so I could benefit from learning them again.