C# Textbooks

I've been getting questions about C# (pronounced Sea Sharp or C Sharp) textbooks for high school courses lately. There are a lot of C# books out there but I think most of them are aimed either at professional developers or college level programs. Teachers are teaching C# in high schools though and I can't say that I blame them. C# is a great language. The advent of the XNA Studio Express which runs on top of Visual C# Express and uses C# as the development language is only going to increase interest in C# among students.

I have asked a couple of high school teachers I know and respect for their opinions. One school did a pretty exhaustive search and is using  C# Software Solutions by John Lewis from Addison Wesley. I talked to another teacher who is using Microsoft Visual C# .NET Step By Step: Version 2003 by John Sharp & Jon Jagger from Microsoft Press.

Another teacher is not using classroom sets but teaches from his own notes. He is using several books as references including:

• Visual C# 2005 How to Program             ISBN#0131525239.
• Professional C# 2005 3rd Ed                  ISBN#0764575341
• C# Database Programming                     ISBN#0782141838,
• Microsoft Visual C# 2005 Step by Step    ISBN#0735621292

I know that Course Technology and Pearson Technology also have C# books that would probably work for high school students. I'm sure that others do as well. Since I haven't looked at them myself (if any publishers want to send me review copies I will write up some reviews) and no one has recommended them to me personally I am not sure what to say about them.

I'd really love to hear from other teachers who are teaching C# and get more opinions about C# books. What have you found that is good, bad or indifferent? What are you looking for in a C# textbook?

Comments

• Anonymous
  October 02, 2006
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