Over the course of the past semester, I’ve chosen to learn about coding for my Learning Project. Although it was a rocky road, I’ve learned more than I thought I ever would about coding and programming. Computer Science, Engineering, Programming etc., have never been topics I’ve been very interested in learning about, so I believe I went wayyyy out of my comfort zone with this one, and have been pleased with the things I’ve learned and the progress I’ve made.

Below is a brief overview of my coding journey, including information on the content I wrote about, the triumphs and troubles I had, as well as the organization and structure of my posts:

Bro Code

  • Still unsure of how to start my project, I had been reading articles about successful entrepreneurs and startup businesses, and wanting to learn from them in one way or another.
  • In this post I have a whole page of words, with one video at the end (not a visually appealing post!).

via GIPHY

 

ERROR_CODE

  • The majority of my work at this point had been reading articles, talking to educators and colleagues in different faculties, and watching YouTube videos.
    • I remember trying to venture out with some of the online work I was doing, but because I was unfamiliar with literally everything about the subject itself, there was a lot of groundwork to put in before I got to the fun stuff! (although, reading is fun stuff, so what am I saying here?).
  • A couple of weeks in though, and I am surprised I posted anything this week, with how boring my post was; the title of my post accurately depicts my thoughts, feelings, and experiences at this point in my learning.

 

Eye-Tracking Hackathon

  • This was my favourite way to learn about coding — face-to-face, questions and answers, and sharing experiences.
    • I attended a Hackathon, collaborating with a number of people in the University community, trying to create an app for people with mobility challenges to be able to produce art with nothing but eye-movement.
      • This event was a lot more draining than I had anticipated; yes, we were using our eyes to draw on the screen, but usually our eyes are used as receptors, and not as actual tools for creation. I don’t think I realized how much my eyes wander, until I was given the chance to do the opposite, and see the immediate results on the screen.
    • Still very new to coding, and lacking direction, it was nice to interact with people who were very knowledgeable, and very resourceful in regard to computer programming.
      • Up to this point, the work I had done was not substantial enough to create any kind of interesting blog posts, so I believe this is where my interest in the subject was strengthened, and my blog posts finally began representing that.

 

Hello Processing!

  • My first Hour of Code project was called Hello Processing! and took me through an hour of coding in the visual arts.
    • This program was recommended to me by someone I met at the Hackathon, because it is a happy medium between some of the projects aimed at school aged children and some of the projects that are solely based on the creation of code.
  • In regard to the content/structure of my post, this is the point where I began using more links, GIPHY, and even videos (although I had not experimented with Screencastify yet, so it’s just a shaky phone video of what I was working on).

 

…_ _ _… (SOS) Morse Code is Coding, Right?

  • Still lacking clear direction on where to take my learning project, and in combination with my unconscious and subconscious thought, I had a dream about communicating in Morse Code, which led me on an exploration of coding and ciphers.
  • Through this exploration, I found an article about a man who taught himself to code, tracked his steps, and provided insights on where to really begin my journey into coding.
  • So although I had been setting the groundwork for coding, and blogging, drawing from multiple resources, this is where I believe my journey really took off — and of course it was because of the dream I had on a pirate ship.

via GIPHY

 

Harry Potter Puns: They Can Slytherin to any Conversation

  • I finally chose a direction for my learning project, and began learning the coding language called Python.
    • With Python, I began my 8-week course, going through tutorials, while the program tracked my progress for me.
  • Although I know I was very confused while I was writing this post, I know I was becoming more open-minded with my approaches to learning about coding as well as blogging.
  • In this post, I have shorter blocks of text, quite a few links, a couple of gifs, and my first Screencastify video, making the post itself more engaging on a topic that many people are not particularly interested in reading about.

 

Monty Python… and the Holy Grail

  • As I continued on my journey with Python, I was finding it was becoming easy to lose interest with the program I was working through.
    • I think part of this is because literally ALLLLL I did, every night for over a week, was work through Python tutorials, and didn’t always understand what I was doing, or how I was coming up with the solutions I came up with.
  • I ended up searching for other resources to help me learn Python, in hopes of finding something to pique my interest again, and re-focus myself.
    • I found an incredible introductory level, college course outline for learning Python.
      • The site provides a detailed outline on how to learn Python over the course of a semester, with helpful links, articles, and book references.
      • Because this is an intro level, college course, the approach to learning is structured in a way that I am familiar with, so I found it easy to navigate and reference back to alongside my codecademy course.
  • The further I progress with my posts, the more I understand the idea of quality over quantity, and believe the content of my posts are finally beginning to reflect that.

“Scratch”-ing My Head

  • Over the course of the semester, there were a number of assigned blog posts, relating to EdTech in one way or another, and this one happened to be about coding!
  • I chose to try out Scratch for this post, which is a free programming platform to create and play interactive games and animations.
    • To be completely honest, I did not like this site in the slightest.
      • Because I have been working with Python, and more “university-type” resources for learning about coding, the layout and presentation of this site was extremely distracting, as it is geared toward younger children.
  • The lesson I learned from this site was more so a reminder of the different learning styles people have, and that sometimes in education, there will be things I review, that I don’t understand or don’t liked — this was one of those things.

 

“I’ve got 99 problems but a switch ain’t one”

  • As one of my last Learning Project posts, for the semester, I think this post is one that I’ve most connected with. I guess one of the challenges learning something that I had zero prior knowledge on, was a little more difficult than I had anticipated.
  • Although this post reflects on the challenges I’ve been facing while learning Python, it is also a post about how I’m finally learning HOW to learn about coding, working through the processes, and incorporating a number of resources to strengthen my understanding.

 

Anyway, I think that’s a wrap! Because I’m in the middle of my 8-week Python course, I am going to try and continue with the tutorials and complete the program. I don’t know when I will really use coding in the near future, but I’ve certainly gained some valuable skills and lessons on science, technology, and applications to education.

Overall, I found learning how to code, may not have been the best or easiest thing to learn about for a self-directed study, because it was such a new topic, with new concepts, new terminology, and new everything really. Also, there wasn’t anyone in my class learning how to code, or even learning something remotely close to coding, so I wasn’t able to interact and exchange many resources or findings with my classmates, and I think because it is such an unknown topic for many of the people I did interact with, I didn’t receive too much feedback on the posts that I did have about coding.

And although I had my doubts about this process — choosing any one thing to learn about — I’m happy that I chose something completely out of my knowledge base and comfort zone. This way I was actually forced into learning and documenting my project, rather than just solely drawing on prior knowledge and bs’ing my way through!

 

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *