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Are you new to coding and not really sure what it’s all about? Learn from Mari Bailey, iRelaunch's Operations Manager and her tips as she considered whether coding was the right path for her relaunch.
If you heard Becca Rosenthal’s podcast about her experience at
Hackbright Academy, you know that a coding bootcamp is an intense
learning environment for people who are committed to building job-ready
coding skills.
But what if you’re new to coding and not really sure what it’s all
about? During my career break I got curious about coding. And I liked
the idea of learning coding via a structured online class that would
teach me the basics and let me work at my own pace. I quickly discovered
that there are a lot of good free/inexpensive online resources to
learn; honestly, the amount of choices can be overwhelming.
Everyone has a different learning style, so you have to find what type
of learning platform works for you. To get you started, here are a
couple of online learning platforms that I have enjoyed:
Udemy has video-based
courses in topics ranging from home improvement to art to coding. They
have a large variety of coding courses so you’ll want to “shop around”
for one that you like – be sure to preview any courses you’re interested
in so you can get a sense of the instructor’s teaching style.
Each course has a Q&A section; some instructors actively engage in
the Q&A and others don’t. The instructors encourage students to help
each other with the Q&A because you learn by teaching.
freeCodeCamp
uses text-based and video-based instruction, and their curriculum
consists of specific areas in which you can earn a certification (e.g.,
web design or machine learning). For my certification, I worked through a
series of text-based tutorials and added my code to an interactive web
page; I’d only move forward if I answered the questions correctly. Upon
completion of the tutorials, there are several projects that must be
completed -- incorporating the concepts you have learned -- in order to
earn your certification.
freeCodeCamp also has a community platform where members share advice, feedback, and encouragement, as well as an active blog.
No matter what online learning platform you use, here are some general tips that I found helpful:
Create! Don’t get stuck in permanent tutorial mode. While you pick up concepts by coding along with the tutorial, the real learning comes when you create something of your own from scratch.
Start small – if you try to do something too ambitious from the start, you’ll likely end up getting frustrated. I learned this the hard way; it’s much more satisfying to build up to something rather than the other way around.
Make it meaningful - sometimes it’s hard to come up with a project idea when you have a blank slate in front of you…so try to figure out if you can make something that you’d actually want to use.…or just have fun – one of my assignments was to create a survey form. I decided this was a perfect opportunity to test out my new sushi product ideas...(sushi smoothies, anyone?)
Learn from other sources - supplement your learning by reading coding blogs and listening to coding podcasts. Again, there are so many resources to choose from, many of them with advice and encouragement for beginners and beyond.
Experiment! – Don’t feel like once you start a certain language or
framework that you have to stick with it. If you love it, that’s great,
but if you’re curious about other languages or frameworks, by all means
try them out!
I’ll be honest – I’ve stepped away from my coding hobby since returning
to work…but I know that it will be waiting for me whenever I’m ready to
get back to it!
Join our growing relauncher communities on Facebook and LinkedIn. For more great guidance on your relaunch and updates on when return to work programs are accepting applications, events for relaunchers and more, be sure to sign up for our Return to Work Report and follow us on social media to stay informed!