Anyone notice that the way playgrounds teaches a switch to be open or closed is backwards from electrical theory?

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Trying out playgrounds for the first time and I noticed something a little odd. In the first lesson when it talks about moving byte to toggle a switch it clearly said that the light turns on when the switch is ”Open” and off when “Closed”. This seems counter intuitive to the way we would normally teach electrical theory. We would use the example of a simple electrical circuit with a light. When the switch is closed the light turns on because the circuit is complete and the light receives power. When the circuit is open there is a break in the circuit and the light can not receive power. Just wonderiong if there was a specfic reason for teaching it this way in playgrounds?

Swift Playgrounds

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Posted by

Iceman2009

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Answer 1

Unfortunately I do not have the answer, and you would think that after 4 years someone might know this answer.

I have been looking for the answer as well because I have been looking to help my kids understand programming. Similar to how the Playgrounds App companies programming to real life I was going to tie this concept to a race track or light switch, but that would just enter another level of confusion.

Even in binary a 0 is Open / Off and 1 is Closed / On. I thought I might have been the crazy one but this article from Lewis University that goes into detail of how binary computing works lays it out well.

”A switch, unless it’s busted, can be either on or off, closed or open. A switch that is “on” or “closed” passes electrical signal through it, while a switch that is “off” or “open” blocks that signal. Computer Scientists represent an “on” switch with a 1 and an “off” switch with a 0.”

https://www.lewisu.edu/experts/wordpress/index.php/whats-with-all-the-1s-and-0s/

Posted by

bburt85

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Anyone notice that the way playgrounds teaches a switch to be open or closed is backwards from electrical theory?

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