Learning to Code: Eight Steps to Master for Beginners
As a beginner in programming, you may find it confusing where to start. The confusion is obvious as you are not introduced to a lot of coding until your junior or senior secondary education. So, is there any way that you can map your coding journey? Yes, there is. In this blog, you’ll find the 8 steps which will help you to master coding as a beginner.
Undoubtedly, joining online coding courses is the way to master coding skills.
Let’s get started!
- Start with a question: why do you want to code?
Many people want to code as they find it a fascinating career option. However, they don’t know why they actually want to code. Apart from the fascination for coding, you must also know what career you want to pursue as a coder.
Programming can be learned for various career options. Some of the major career options are full stack software or web developer, front end developer, back end developer, etc.
Besides these career options, there are many others where basic coding or knowledge of easy languages is required. For example, data analysis, Machine Learning engineering, AI engineering and many more. So, you should know that will be your career path after learning to code.
- Gather all the supplies
Now, once you get familiar with your career path, you are ready to gather the resources. Coding requires some important tools like IDE, code inspectors and debuggers. These tools help you to write efficient code and make your code error-free.
As you start, you can use tools like Notepad in Windows and TextEdit in Mac to write codes. Moreover, as you grow, you can shift to Integrated Development Environments or IDEs to code more effectively.
However, if you have a PC or laptop which is very powerful, then you can use online compilers to run your code. These compilers run on cloud computing, so it doesn’t require a powerful local setup. You can access many online compilers with your browser and a stable internet connection.
For debugging, there are many ideas and compilers that you will find already embedded. But you can also get separate debuggers and code inspectors online.
- Choose the right language
Choose the programming language you want to learn first. You should know multiple programming languages if you want to get into a high-paying job, but in the beginning, you should start learning one. The language that you choose should be easy to learn.
Firstly, your basics of coding get clear easily. For example, learn the basics of JS. Secondly, you can get an entry-level role in any company, which will give you financial independence to learn more about coding and other programming languages.
- Learn the language you chose
Now it’s time to learn the language that you have chosen. There are various ways to learn programming in a particular language. You can learn coding through an offline course or an online one. Online coding courses are in trend nowadays for so many reasons.
Online coding courses are very flexible compared to offline courses. You can pursue an online course at your preferred pace and time. Online coding courses are also more economical than offline ones.
Moreover, the competition in the world of online coding courses benefits students a lot as they get to learn through industry experts who have worked for big tech companies. Online coding courses from companies like Coding Ninjas are mentored by tutors from companies like Amazon and Google.
- Do your first coding project
As you get some experience in coding, you should start your first coding project. Start by defining the needs of your project, such as the components that must be there in your project. For example, in the care of a Website, there should be a huge page, multiple landing pages and many features.
If you enrol in online coding courses, there is a high chance that you’ll get guided projects with the course. These projects are put in multiple places in the course with varying difficulty.
- Comment on your code
You can write comments on your program, which will help you and others understand the workings of your program and its algorithm. These comments aren’t involved in the core of your program.
The purpose of these comments is to remind you of the logic of your program when you look back at it after some time. In the beginning, you get help from various sources, so you may not remember everything about your code. In such cases, these comments are found useful.
- Connect with a Community
You can connect with a coding community through online platforms like GitHub. There, you’ll find many programmers who will have immense knowledge of coding. Here, you can put your first project to let others test it, correct you and tell you the better approach to the same thing you did in your program.
These communities are also found useful for experienced programmers when they are stuck with a problem.
- Keep learning new things
Lastly, you can get a lot of problems online, which are specifically made to access your particular coding skills. Try Solving them and also work on new projects. Moreover, once you find yourself good at your first programming language, you can continue to learn other coding languages. You can follow the same path to learn the next language, but it will surely take less time as you’ll already know a lot about coding.
How to Learn the basics of js?
If you want to learn the basics of JS, then you can find many courses online for beginners where you will get a detailed introduction to JS. These courses explain the basics of JS, like the syntax, structure, components and other necessary elements.
Conclusion
With the above eight-step guide, you can start your journey as a new coder. However, if you want to get a more structured learning of coding, then a graduate course will be better. This guide is basically for those who want to learn coding before they enrol for a degree course to get an edge in their College studies.
