Anyone can learn to code, we are constantly told these days, but is it true? Yes… in the same sense that it is true that anyone can learn to play a musical instrument. Many people do, and many of them get a great deal of personal satisfaction from it, play in bands, write songs, meet new people, and lots of other good things.

But if a man selling guitars and guitar lessons tells you that playing the guitar is a guaranteed route to a well paid, secure career, then you would be wise to take that with a pinch† of salt. Or worse, if he tries to convince you that your kids should just learn to play the guitar and join a Silicon Roundabout startupband, instead of studying traditional subjects.

Similarly anyone can learn to cook, but the skills required to cater a dinner party for some friends don’t scale up to catering a formal reception for hundreds, or running a restaurant. Not even Jamie Oliver is stupid enough to try to convince anyone his books and TV shows will teach you that. If schools taught people to cook meals from basic ingredients then as a nation we would be healthier, wealthier and happier, but they can’t even manage that… Why does anyone think they can teach “coding”?

† Handful