Talk about coding in general. Have you found any commonalities between code and other aspects of your life?
I’ve found that learning to code with the Flatiron School has helped to reinforce to me how I learn best: by putting directly into practice that which I’ve learned! The approach I’ve taken so far (which has really seemed to work out nicely!) is that I try to maintain a top-down approach to the material.
If I feel like a particular lab has me stuck and I’m not making the progress that I need to finish the material within the course of a week, I allow myself to complete all of the readings so that any and all new topics have time to digest and there is less to surprise me later in the labwork. During each reading, I make notecards, typically formatting the material in the form of a question (if I struggle to do this, then I google to better understand or sometimes even use the “Objectives” section to format a few nice, overview topic cards. Examples I have on me at the moment include:
“What is React?” A JavaScript library created by Facebook, used for building UI’s & front-end applications. Often called a framework.
and
“How do React events differ from browser events?” Browser Events: vs React Events naming: completely lowercase camel-cased and typically begin with “on” + Event name
wrapping: are not wrapped wrapped in SyntheticEvents, which helps to standardize for compatibility
Some of my coursework (Introduction to I/O Psychology) and own personal readings prior to joining Flatiron (mainly self-development material in the vein of Cal Newport) taught me how to most efficiently study, a large part of which was developing fluency in the material. Making these flash cards helps me to better adhere to the material in a way in which I can confidently discuss it and communicate issues with others. And briefly flipping through them before studying I’ve found gives me a nice shot of confidence (“look at all this material I’ve already covered!”) as well as contextualizes anything I might encounter new that day in my studies.
Although programming languages are not spoken, I have found that developing fluency with concepts (flashcards) and syntax (lab coursework and projects), have been what has best helped me to understand and fully engage with the material here at Flatiron.