Test-First Teaching
summary
Claims that writing tests before code teaches programming effectively, with concrete materials: Ruby Koans, RailsBridge Workshops, Wolfram Arnold's BFT, Blazing Cloud classes and the Learn Ruby TFT curriculum at testfirst.org. Exercises are microtests (calculator null case, pig‑latin translator) that start with failing tests first, use pairing and spec frameworks, and escalate to integration experiments like 50 depositors 25,000 deposits to expose race conditions. Student evaluations report higher engagement and reproducible learning outcomes; solutions and site are open source for contributors.
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chapters (9)
- 0:00Start
- 2:21What is Test-First Teaching?
- 2:48Pairing Is Teaching
- 7:57Learning Ruby via Tests
- 16:53Embrace Failure
- 20:44Strings
- 23:02Iterators
- 25:02method_missing, nested closures, and the builder pattern
- 27:05Sarah
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