Promoting Computer Literacy Through Programming Python

Promoting Computer Literacy Through Programming Python

Coding Literacy

How the theoretical tools of literacy help us understand programming in its historical, social and conceptual contexts. The message from educators, the tech community, and even politicians is clear: everyone should learn to code. To emphasize the universality and importance of computer programming, promoters of coding for everyone often invoke the concept of “literacy,” drawing parallels between reading and writing code and reading and writing text. In this book, Annette Vee examines the coding-as-literacy analogy and argues that it can be an apt rhetorical frame. The theoretical tools of literacy help us understand programming beyond a technical level, and in its historical, social, and conceptual contexts. Viewing programming from the perspective of literacy and literacy from the perspective of programming, she argues, shifts our understandings of both. Computer programming becomes part of an array of communication skills important in everyday life, and literacy, augmented by programming, becomes more capacious. Vee examines the ways that programming is linked with literacy in coding literacy campaigns, considering the ideologies that accompany this coupling, and she looks at how both writing and programming encode and distribute information. She explores historical parallels between writing and programming, using the evolution of mass textual literacy to shed light on the trajectory of code from military and government infrastructure to large-scale businesses to personal use. Writing and coding were institutionalized, domesticated, and then established as a basis for literacy. Just as societies demonstrated a “literate mentality” regardless of the literate status of individuals, Vee argues, a “computational mentality” is now emerging even though coding is still a specialized skill.

Programming with MicroPython

It’s an exciting time to get involved with MicroPython, the re-implementation of Python 3 for microcontrollers and embedded systems. This practical guide delivers the knowledge you need to roll up your sleeves and create exceptional embedded projects with this lean and efficient programming language. If you’re familiar with Python as a programmer, educator, or maker, you’re ready to learn—and have fun along the way. Author Nicholas Tollervey takes you on a journey from first steps to advanced projects. You’ll explore the types of devices that run MicroPython, and examine how the language uses and interacts with hardware to process input, connect to the outside world, communicate wirelessly, make sounds and music, and drive robotics projects. Work with MicroPython on four typical devices: PyBoard, the micro:bit, Adafruit’s Circuit Playground Express, and ESP8266/ESP32 boards Explore a framework that helps you generate, evaluate, and evolve embedded projects that solve real problems Dive into practical MicroPython examples: visual feedback, input and sensing, GPIO, networking, sound and music, and robotics Learn how idiomatic MicroPython helps you express a lot with the minimum of resources Take the next step by getting involved with the Python community