A code newbie's journey.
Tags: beginners, codenewbie, frontend, learning
Published: 2023-06-15 10:55:18



## Background


Hi, I'm Yvonne. I'm a mother to two teenage boys, and I am some form of permanently exhausted pigeon. I used to be a diagnostic radiographer, but I decided to change careers to better suit my personal circumstances. Constantly changing shift patterns are not the most child friendly!

Tech was suggested to me by some friends as a career with a better work/life balance. What they said to me made sense, but... where to start?


I spent hours looking through the various roles within the tech industry. I installed Visual Studio Code and started dabbling in Python. Eventually, I ended up falling in love with front-end development.


As I tried to learn, the vast amount of information on websites and YouTube was overwhelming me. Rather than progressing, I was going back and forth over the same issues or jumping too far ahead of my understanding. One evening, out of utter frustration, I decided to look into courses. As much as I wanted to self-learn, I realised I still needed a structure. I tried a couple of courses on Udemy, but I just didn't gel with them. I ended up on freeCodeCamp (highly recommended!) which then lead me to Scrimba.





## Starting my Scrimba journey


Originally, I started using Scrimba's free tutorials with VS Code, and, well, I was hooked. They were clear and well-structured. The most important thing for me, though, was that they also forced me to stop and try to find the answer myself first. I was learning nothing from copying code step-by-step from a teacher, like in other courses.


The structure and delivery of the lessons helped me focus on the aspect of the code we were studying. I wasn't getting overwhelmed, as I was solving one problem at a time. It changed my whole perspective. I now had a clear vision of how I would achieve my goal of learning the skills to be a front-end developer.


After completing a few different free sections, I decided to take a look into the paid options for Scrimba and decided to try the pro membership. I was not disappointed. I am currently enrolled on the Frontend Developer Career Path, which I aim to have finished by the end of this year. There was a fantastic wealth of knowledge in a structured and easy-to-understand format. There is also a discord community. It's great. It's a networking tool, but it's also an educational one. It allows me to share experiences with other students in the same position. I get to share in their struggles and learn from their projects, as well as my own. **Students are learning from students**, rather than parroting a teacher.

At first, getting to grips with the interactive tutorials was a challenge. You pause the video, write the needed code and then you save the note. It helps that the interface is very similar to VS Code. You can see in real-time the effect of the changes you are making, on the same screen. It really helped my understanding.


## My most recent project, via Scrimba Frontend Developer Career Pathway

At the end of every section, you complete a solo project. My most recent project was a type of mobile endorsement app. Which was built using Firebase, HTML, CSS and JS.

This was my first solo project where I decided that I'm going to try the 'stretch goals'. It was challenging for me and, at times, I had to go away and take a break out of sheer frustration. Why are "like" reactions so important anyway? 

The part of this project, that I spent most of my time on was attempting to understand the append function. Why are you so difficult sometimes, Javascript?




![Image description](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/iuz6l82rxnsy30oiv4qs.PNG)

This code snippet appends a new item to the endorsements list in the UI. It includes the endorsement details, the "likes" count, and a "like" icon. It also includes the functionality for incrementing the "like" count when clicked, as well as updating the count in the database.

This was achieved with a lot of googling, going back over my old notes and looking at other students' work. In the end, I **DID** manage to complete it and it's probably my proudest coding achievement to date. Admittedly, I still don't have a full understanding of the intricacies of Firebase, and I am still nowhere near a js **WHIZZ.** However, I do believe that with enough practice, it will get easier and easier.

## Project's UI.
![Image description](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/lzj7nrdsgsqxjroosrbl.PNG)
![Image description](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/uhzec8wac60j7g8rrkvg.PNG)

I would honestly recommend Scrimba to anyone who is learning to code, even if it is just for the free tutorials. Check them out! They are a team of fantastic people, who work hard to make learning to code accessible for all.

## Future Conquests


- Conitinuing to follow the scrimba pathway!
- Partake in hackathons!
- Become compentent in HTML, CSS, JS, React, typescript and many more.
- **GET HIRED AS A JUNIOR DEVELOPER**


##  Advice to other newbies

1) This is pretty cliché, but don't be too hard on yourself! Learning a completely new skill is never going to be a smooth ride. There will be some bumps in the road. Many times I have thought to myself, 'I just cannot do this!'
 
Take a break, regather your thoughts, and keep pushing!

2) Organise your learning. Have a clear plan of what area you are going to be specifically working on. It's more productive than trying to learn everything all at once!

3) Find your learning style! Are you better with video tutorials and coding along with the instructor? Completing solo projects; interactive tutorials, studying from books? Realistically you are probably going to need a mix but tweaked to what you find suits you best.

4) JUST KEEP CODING ANYTHING, ANYTIME, ANYWHERE.

Thank you for reading my story,
Yvonne.