On the weekend I was at the school reuni...

On the weekend I was at the school reunion and among other matters I gave my school a present of 50 Ubuntu CDs to use in school and to give out to the pupils most interested in computers. After that I talked to my IT teacher who is now an IT adviser to the principal. It seems that all that we were taught in high school (Office software) is being move down to grade school and it is currently unclear, what will be taught to high school students. It could be programming, but it would take a large pile of time and money to prepare all the teachers for that.
It is quite a food for thought - find something challenging enough to teach at 11th and 12th grade to children that have learned all of word processing and presentation making while in their 5th grade and in the same time make it very easy to prepare 40+ year old teachers to teach that material.
In this context I find the project Little Wizard very interesting - if basics of programming can be taught so easily, maybe we still have a chance of getting it into the mandatory curriculum.