Controversy on how to teach CS 1: a discussion on the SIGCSE-members mailing list

A discussion took place on the SIGCSE mailing list in late March of 2004 that raised important issues on how to teach introductory courses using Java. This article attempts to summarize several of the important points raised during this discussion, among them whether or how objects should be taught early or late in a CS 1 course, or indeed, whether object-oriented languages should be postponed until a second course.