Why spend so much time on RGB?

Just feedback for the new curriculum… Why is there so much emphasis put on rgb values? I think they could be introduced and used a time or two, but this took 1/2 of the class period when the important thing in this lesson is learning how to use classes in the css file.

Kammie,

I didn’t write the curriculum, but here’s my two cents. Classes and ID’s can get very complex as students get into inheritance and all the things you can do with them, but they are just touched upon in the last level as a “next step” for students - I found RGB colors much more concrete for my students to understand and use the day of, when they struggled with Classes and I worked with individual students on CSS as they had different levels of understanding. Probably would be nice to have some additional “optional” levels focused on CSS classes and ID’s for students that are ready for it.

Again, I don’t know if that makes sense, but that’s how I understood it (plus teaching classes and ID’s in the past I found it’s more abstract for students to get within a class period or even a few class periods).

Brad

In years past, I just used hex colors and color pickers making the number just a copy and paste. Done and easy.
I do agree it seems strange that so much time is spent with it.
Maybe they spend time on this because if students take the CSP class it helps introduce the idea of 0-255 as being the numbers being able to be represented as a byte.

I’d also add that RGB colors continue to be present in Unit 3. Not only can students use RGB to customize their colors, but they can also randomize the values to create some fun effects. I also agree with what John Old is hypothesizing - Understanding how RGB colors work reveals some other ideas that are central to a broad study of computer science. It’s interesting for students to realize that all of the light we say on our computer screens is actually comprised of mixtures of red, green, and blue.

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