The top 10 reasons why object-oriented programming can't be taught in CS 1

Abstract

Over the past year we have changed our CS 1 course from a standard Pascal-based, procedural programming course into one that emphasizes C++ and object-oriented programming (OOP). While our experience to date indicates that this was a good decision for both our students and our department, the decision did not come easy. We struggled long and hard with many, if not most, of the questions and issues that have come to be associated with teaching OOP to undergraduates. This paper recounts our struggles, and presents our responses to the more serious of the pedagogical questions that we considered. In hindsight, many of the reasons we came up with for not using OOP in CS1 are seen to reflect our lack of understanding of the paradigm, our fear of the language, and our past experience teaching Pascal and the procedural paradigm. Furthermore, we believe that our reservations (which appear to be quite common) stemmed from a growing body of misleading OOP folklore that is contrary to our experience and that this paper attempts to dispel.