Why Programming for all?

Kelleher argues that the skills learned in programming can be applied to learning in other disciplines. Programming gives students experience with complex systems. In practicing programming, students create their own programs and have to isolate the cause of any problem their program is having if it doesn't work as they expect it to. This process can be applied to countless situations in one's education and real life. She give the example of one's car not working. The ability to isolate the problem after analyzing the symptoms could enable you to fix the car on your own or at least understand the problem well enough to avoid getting squeezed by the mechanic for unnecessary repairs. At the very least Kelleher points out that many people will be required to do some type of programming in their occupation and if not they will probably have to work with people who do and it will help to understand how to communicate with them and understand the parameters they are working within. I guess an example of this is when you are developing a product, say a web site, for a client, and after all of the planning has been done and the product is near completion they ask if some additional functionality can just quickly be added, not understanding at all what adding it would entail. It's happened to me. �