Born and raised in SIlicon Valley, my entire life I have been smothered in technology. My mom is an executive at a cyber-security company and my dad is a CEO for a tech start-up, so tech is our thing. As a teenager in the 21st century, I’m constantly using my phone or computer, naturally. Enough said, coding surrounds me. You. All of us.
Coding is everywhere, yet so little know how to do it. Result? The opportunities are like an empty field (pun intended) of gold... or jobs. Knowing this, I wanted to learn to code to open myself to the opportunities it presents (and get some gold). Not to mention, I get street cred with all the neighbors AKA the high tech companies.
Specifically, my project is to learn how to code using HTML5 and CSS a biology website. I’ll learn a language of code, embrace the area, and discover more in-depth on the topic I choose to cover.
A 20 time project is a project picked by the student to explore more about a topic that interests them, using 20% of their class time. As I said before, I chose this because I want to open myself up to more areas of work. I want to learn more about something that greatly affects our lives. Knowing this, my essential question is “Why code.”
My short-term goals are to continue completing the exercises provided by codecademy.com. Long term, I would like to finish the lesson (approx. 10 hours). Overall, I want to code a website.
Currently, I’m measuring my progress by monitoring the exercises I’ve completed. Right now, I’m 49% through the lesson. My progress will be measured over what I’ve completed, and eventually, my work towards the website.
Every day for 20 time, I will learn the code through the exercises. Once I complete that, I will judge if I need additional practice. If so, I can work on another lesson. After that, I will figure out what topic to put on the site. Then, I’ll work on the code for the website.
I think that this is a super fun project. Software is a huge part of our future with technology like phones and computers. I am also trying to learn some code currently, and one thing that is very important is to know how each concept is applied. Learning the concept may be difficult, but the application could be really counterproductive if you are not sure where each concept is used. Overall, this is a really good experiment. Good luck!
ReplyDeleteCoding is a great idea! This is great to learn about because it can be applied to classes like CS. You could take this class next year with the information you collect. I would make the website about something you like and enjoy. How will you track your progress?
ReplyDeleteTheo
I like how everyone is talking about phones and computers which are hardware, but not really about the software inside of it... anyways... 😛
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This seems like a doable project, being that you just learn HTML and CSS from a free service, and redistribute your knowledge for free... You're purpose is to teach others, which might be better than lessons, as you understand more like what it is to be a learner. However, how in depth are you planning to make these tutorials? You say here is an "empty field" which is partially correct as in there is a big one. How much of web dev do you expect to cover? Also, are you writing a web site to teach others to learn coding? Are you building it from scratch? with/without apis? Do you plan to host it yourself or pay someone else to host it for you? Are you willing to pay out of your own pocket or get a sponsor, say from your parents? You seem interested in web dev, but do you have what it takes to build the backend to your server, too? Add protection against DDoSers or hackers (assuming you have the popularity to attract those kinds of people)? Anyone can build a simple website on weebly [...or blogger ;) ], and the user wouldn't know the difference. So how is your project from scratch going to fare with the quality of those? I'd like to hear back your responses!
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---Matt