The readings and responses listed here should take you approximately 1.5 total hours.
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1. Learning Fluency by Turing alum Sara Simon (30 min)
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Your key take-aways OR how you're going to implement specific points (minimum 3):
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I like how she broke down learning words in chunks of 5 and repetition allowed her to learn characters and words.
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Must balance out natural context (instinct) and practiced skill (learning the right way).
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Learning language isn't just about understanding. It's also about fluency by repeated and varied interactions.
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Things that confused you OR things that you have further questions/thoughts about (minimum 3):
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Why is it that some professors teach understanding over fluency?
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Why did she feel like she needed to give up her creativeness to learn to code? Is it because being fluent requires that?
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Is she saying that you can't be creative and innovative until you have an intimate understanding of a system?
2. How to Google Programming Problems Effectively by Lulu Li (15 min)
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Your key take-aways OR how you're going to implement specific points (minimum 3):
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Be specific in your keywords so Google can find the best results. Don't be too wordy and include the language.
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Use multiple tabs for search results instead of wasting time back-tracking to google.
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"The point of googling is not to find a solution, the point of googling is for you to understand your problems."
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Things that confused you OR things that you have further questions/thoughts about (minimum 3):
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If googling can't be a weakness, can it be a strength?
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Is code on Stack Overflow legal to copy in all situations or will there be a notice?
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Googling "how to" is recommended. Are there any words that do not benefit the search at all and can be left out?
3. 27 Things I Wish I'd Known When I Started Programming by Ken Mazaika (15 min)
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Your key take-aways OR how you're going to implement specific points (minimum 3):
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It's good to collaborate with others when coding because you can talk about problems and code out loud.
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Don't try to learn everything. This is unnecessary.
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Being able to self correct and get back on track is more important than how many hours you have programming.
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Things that confused you OR things that you have further questions/thoughts about (minimum 3):
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You don't need to be a math genius to do programming but does it have any benefits?
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Is it better to think like a human in programming context than a computer?
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Is the author talking about bugs when they mention letting problems pile up?
4. Do Experienced Programmers Use Google Frequently? by Umer Mansoor (10 min)
- Your key take-aways OR how you're going to implement specific points (minimum 2):
- Even the most experienced programmers use google to validate their logic.
- "Never memorize something that you can look up" - Einstein. With technology today we have most answers at our fingertips.
5. 20 Google Search Tips to Use Google More Efficiently by Joseph Hindy (20 min)
- Briefly describe (in your own words) each of the tips below AND provide an example of a search that captures the sentiment of the tip
- Tip 2: Quotes will search for the exact phrase. EX: "If you build it, they will come" movie name
- Tip 3: Using a hyphen will exclude results with that word. EX: kevin costner baseball movie -bull -durham
- Tip 4: Use a colon to search specific sites. EX: game of thrones site:hbo.com
- Tip 9: Use OR to search two things at once. EX: kevin costner OR kevin bacon
- Tip 13: Use words that websites would use. EX: Don't google I have a booboo and it hurts instead use my wound is festering and I am suffering from great agony and discomfort
- Tip 14: Using unimportant words may limit results. EX: Don't google What time is the doctor's office open? instead use doctor's office hours
- Tip 17: Be descriptive and try different words that others would use. EX: Don't google Computer broken instead try computer error blue screen
Code posted on Stack Overflow is fair game to use.
For very specific jobs in the tech industry, a math background will help. However, for web development, it is more important to be able to think logically than to do complex math.