One of the most common questions I'm asked as one of the more tenured attendee's at Lambda School when I run into new students is "What can I do to prepare for class?", so after some thought I decided to foray into the world of online blogging and start sharing my thoughts and experiences while learning to code and becoming a better developer.
When I'm asked this question one of the first things I ask myself is: "What did I really struggle within the beginning of Lambda?". If I'm humble and honest, I struggled to be a student again. I understood most of the concepts especially early on, but as we progressed, I started quickly feeling behind the curve. Now, as a student at the time I wished I found the articles and spoke to others as I've done now and realized this one key thing: It's okay to feel overwhelmed and like you're falling behind. No, really. It is. I'll tell you why. When I hit that "rut" of feeling like I was playing catch up what I hadn't realized what I was actually learning.
What I was actually learning was how to construct a web application from the basics up to intermediate and some borderline advanced techniques as I've continued to grow and study in my time at Lambda (which I will recap as of this writing here shortly). While it felt overwhelming, each piece when understood even only basically built into a greater understanding of the next until before I knew it I was looking at something I'd built that was functional whereas I wouldn't even have fathomed where to begin something like that a short few months before.
As of this writing, I've been enrolled at Lambda School for seven months. I've spent the first four of that in the Full Stack Web Development portion where I've built some pretty cool things some of which were:
- A fully responsive marketing web page for an application to encourage kids for healthier eating.
- A front end using reactjs and redux for an application to enhance mental health
- A back end using nodejs collaborating with our Data Science Engineers to compile, search, and save, over 150,000 Simpson's quotes.
The "second chapter" if you will, of my Lambda School saga, has been as a Team Leader (or TA/Mentor as some may call it). I've got to help guide incoming students through the curriculum that I had just completed while improving my own overall knowledge of code. Primarily the biggest skill I learned here was how to debug. However, I got the opportunity to practice some more code projects while doing so this time around:
- A front end using context api for a web app to organize business cards collected via a QR code.
- Started a react native project from scratch using only a UX designer's guides.
- Reviewed nodejs and how to call in ds over an api to reduce database resource cost.
Now I've moved into my "third chapter" with Lambda, in which I am now a student with a twist. I have been promoted to part-time Section Lead. At this point, we look forward to building a capstone project in labs and then onto to computer science. Alright, you're probably sick of hearing me ramble on about what I've done. You're likely here to calm some of your anxiety as an incoming student, or maybe one who's already begun and stumbled on this. So here it is:
Start learning fundamental javascript as much as possible
Use resources such as:
- Codeacademy, Edabit, Codingame, Hackerrank, CodeWars, or any other resource you find appealing online.
Do not be afraid to google your error, question, or read documentation and readmes
I cannot stress this one enough. The more humble of a developer you are to admit you do not know something, this will open the door to knowing what to research. The key to overcoming your problems with coding will generally lie somewhere that can be referenced. Becoming too reliant on resources outside yourself will be a handicap for you going into the workplace as my limited observation experiences so far have shown me you're largely autonomous.
Read, Rinse, ReRead, Repeat
The 4R's are primarily what I use to remind myself to study my materials for class.
Read
- Lambda generally provides great study materials, use them! If you don't feel that's sufficient for any reason the earlier you start to review the sooner you can look for supplemental help.
Rinse
- This one's my funny little reminder to take breaks, and hydrate all in one. I highly encourage the use of a timer to take breaks every 25 mins or so and get some blood flowing with the hydration.
ReRead
- More or less what it sounds like, study whatever I struggled with before my break, see if I need to review or dig deeper.
Repeat
- When I've caught up and feel comfortable I move on to the new material or next problem I have.
Use your free time to study ahead
Not everyone is fortunate enough to have free time, and that's okay. However, if you find yourself having a coffee staring at the tv, or playing a game when you could be working ahead is when I really started to get comfortable with the curriculum and helped fight off my impostor syndrome. (Future article likely on this)
Use your support system
If you're a student of Lambda reading this, use the systems in place to shore up your knowledge and really be able to break down code. Your leadership is also here for you. We have resources at our disposal to ensure you're a great developer when you leave Lambda School!
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