Coding skills should be basic measure of computer literacy for children

The number of IT students in the UK is falling drastically

The Royal Society has expressed concern about the way that IT is taught in schools, claiming that numbers of students studying computing are plunging across the UK.

There has been a 33 per cent drop in ICT GCSE students in the past three years, a 33 per cent drop in numbers studying A-level ICT in the past six years and a huge 57 per cent drop in A-level computing students over the past eight years in England.

In its new study, the Royal Society outlines its belief that the design and delivery of IT curricula in schools is so poor that students’ understanding and enjoyment of the subjects is severely limited.

The resulting skills deficit in the UK’s IT workforce will have a negative effect on the UK economy.

Dr Andrew Tuson, assistant dean for student recruitment (informatics) at City University London said the report is “extremely timely”. He argued that the ICT syllabus in schools as it stands is unfair to students.

“The current ICT syllabus has the dual effect of putting the bright kids off doing IT, because of the focus on computers – basically the study of using spreadsheets and word processors – while convincing weak students that this is an easy area of study," he said.

“When they study computing for real, they struggle. The system mismanages expectations.”

He explained that the IT industry is about dealing with incredibly difficult technical problems while aligning the technologies innovatively to make businesses more effective.

“That is an area that needs to attract the best and the brightest,” he said.

Tuson explained that primary school students are already extremely able to use technology as they have grown up with it, and suggested that if children have problems with IT, the difficulties are likely to be the result of deeper problems in their general education.

“If a child were having problems with numeracy, that would obviously inhibit his ability to operate spreadsheets. The limiting factor is the core educational element, not their problem with figuring out how to use the technology, because they are already doing so.”

He gave his backing to a notion pioneered by writer and consultant Marc Prensky, who suggests that computer programming should be considered the most basic level of computer literacy in schools, rather than use of applications.

“We should raise what we mean by computer literacy,” said Tuson. “The new government is thinking very differently about education – now is the time to have this discussion.”