The approch described in this paper is about as traditional as I've heard. From the language choices to the proposed sylabus, the CS1 described is the model which has has been followed for years. It describes almost exactly my AP computer science course.

While this approach seems antiquated at first, all of the concepts still apply and the topics list contains nothing which has fallen out of favor in introductions to cs. So while the programming model of choice and the languages of choice have changed since 1984, the basic principles remain very much the same.

Of course it is traditional to us now. It was written in 1984. It is made to be traditional. The languages were the hot new cool things.