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Cody,

May humbly suggest that you pick the techniques you are trying to teach and then select problems that rely and utilize those techniques?

By techniques I mean things like subroutines, references, iteration, simple data structures (stacks, queues, etc.), sorting, recursion.

Then create problems that focus on each specific technique and tell the students that's what the problem is meant to illustrate. For example: sorting -- sort an array of dates of the form "12 Jan 2007".

Random mathematical curiosities is a sure way of turning off most young minds. Remember, most people really hate pointless mathematical exercises.

Good luck,
Rob

In reply to Pick the technique first by Anonymous Monk
in thread Simple but thought-provoking programming tasks [OT] by Cody Pendant

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