The choice of which programming language to use in introductory computer science
courses is guaranteed to spark debate in the computer science community. Programming
languages used in computer science instruction have followed various trends or fads within
the computing industry. The language choice has often been between languages which are
currently in wide use by industry for software production. While it is true that computer
science education has a responsibility to achieve a balance between providing training in
current practices within the field and core concepts and theory, it is felt that computer
science education should not be overly influenced by popular trends when choosing a
programming language to use in the teaching of introductory computer science. This paper
offers other criteria for the choice of language together with examples.
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