Advice on Learning to Program

Assigned:
Mon, Sep 15
Due:
Wed, Sep 17

Despite the awful clickbait title and its unfortunate emphasis on productivity (as opposed to quality), this article gives good advice about developing your code skills. Its advice is especially useful when learning a new language.

(Hat tip to Prof. Bret Jackson for finding the article.)

  • Tips #1 and #6 both emphasize the importance of playing with code as you learn to program. Think about your own learning style. Do you lean more toward active learning or receptive learning? In other words, do prefer to jump in and play with new ideas right away (active), or do you prefer to listen and observe first (receptive)? A mix? One first, then the other? What can you change to gain more from the learning style that you prefer less?

  • Think about something (not programming) that you are good at or especially enjoy doing. and that some people would consider difficult. Think about how you learned to do that thing. Do this article’s tips resemble your learning process for that other activity? What are the notable similarities and differences?

  • Tips #4 and #5 both emphasize the importance of getting help from outside sources when you are stuck. Think about:

    • a situation in this course where getting help from friends or the internet would be a good thing, and
    • a situation in this course where that would be inappropriate or even cheating.

    (Check the syllabus for the rules!)

  • As the article mentions, some companies ask people to sketch out code on paper in job interviews. And sometimes computer science classes give tests on paper Why might that that be?

Share any thoughts you have about the process of learning to code, and learning a new programming language. I hope for some class discussion in our Slack channel, but you are also welcome to share your thoughts privately with me if you don’t want to share them with the whole class.