Idk, if we're working on a remote machine already, it's not the student's first day. The bar to basic editing with vim is pretty low. Mode switch with i and esc, :x to save/exit, navigate where your fingers already are, slash to find. That all fits on a sticky note if it isn't already memorized in the first 30 seconds. They've likely played video games their whole lives, I struggle to see how mapping buttons to behaviors is a foreign or difficult concept.

As you say we're teaching programming. The ability to pick up an unfamiliar tool and get to know it on the fly is critical and the only way to develop it is practice.