Learning Web Development at 32 Years Old: My First 7 Months of Learning With freeCodeCamp, Viking Code School, Udemy, Frontend Masters & Thinkful

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In this post I’m going to walk through my journey learning web development so far. I’ll be taking a broad overview of the experience — in a later post I’ll write in depth reviews about my favorite courses.

Some Background

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I started studying web development seriously last year (June of 2017) at the ripe age of 32. I took a class in college (HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and MATLAB) and it was my favorite of all my classes in college, but I ended up deciding not to pursue it more extensively. I considered changing majors to computer science, but seeing my CS friends constantly pull all nighters to finish their assignments scared me away from the idea.

Over the years I’ve dabbled with the idea of pursuing programming again, and have spent a few weeks at a time working on some courses, but it never felt very practical. There were some great books and online courses, but nothing made me feel like I could learn enough to get a job in a reasonable amount of time.

Coding Bootcamps

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I got more serious about the idea when I discovered the idea of coding bootcamps in 2014. Up until that point it seemed like my only options were to cobble together an assortment of self-study courses, or go back to school and get a new degree. Coding bootcamps offered a new option — an extremely intense 3 month program where you learn to code for 60+ hours a week, for somewhere between $10,000 and $15,000. Definitely not cheap, but significantly less than getting a full degree in the US.

Unlike a university, which has a broader curriculum including theory and history, these coding bootcamps were intensely practical and only taught students what they would actually be using. It seemed like they were filling an important gap in the marketplace, because I kept coming across success stories from students who had found great jobs at well-known companies after finishing the program.

The coding bootcamps looked like amazing experiences, but I ended up deciding to shelve the idea one more time to avoid taking on more debt. Ten thousand dollars for tuition might be inexpensive compared to a degree, but with the living costs for San Francisco factored in (where the first bootcamps were located), it was still a pretty substantial investment.

Online Bootcamps to the Rescue

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I moved to Los Angeles in 2014 and spent a few years working in commercial production. In the beginning of 2017 I was looking pretty seriously into the idea of moving back to Japan to teach English, when I stumbled across the brand new set of online coding bootcamps that were being released. I spent the entire weekend glued to the computer researching the programs and realized that it was finally within my reach to become a developer.

freeCodeCamp, Code Academy, and Viking Code School

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After researching obsessively for a couple weeks, in June of 2017 I settled on enrolling in Viking Code School. The lowest tier of their program was only $290 a month, and they estimated it would take about 6 months to finish — a total of $1,740 for the whole program. The program was comprised of a text-based curriculum coupled with an assortment of Q&A sessions I could use to ask questions if I got stuck.

I dove into the Viking Code School (VCS) prep course, but I kept finding myself confused, so I also did some of the lessons on freeCodeCamp and Code Academy. I love everything about what they’re doing at freeCodeCamp and highly recommend it to anyone that is interested in learning web development. The challenges are bite-size and addictive, and the community is really supportive.

Eventually I got to the end of the VCS prep and felt like I needed something more extensive. I really liked the structure of the course, but it wasn’t quite getting me to the point where I felt comfortable with the material I was learning. I decided to look around while continuing to do some courses a la cart.

Udemy, Frontend Masters, and Then Thinkful

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For a couple months I jumped between some different courses based on recommendations in the freeCodeCamp forum. I did the following courses (in this order):

• ES6 Javascript: The Complete Developer's Guide on Udemy
• Introduction to JavaScript Programming on Frontend Masters
• You Don't Know JS: Up & Going (book)
• You Don’t Know JS: Scopes & Closures (book)
• JavaScript: Understanding the Weird Parts on Udemy
• Deep JavaScript Foundations on Frontend Masters
• ES6: The Right Parts on Frontend Masters
• You Don't Know JS: this & Object Prototypes (book)

I learned a ton from these courses and would recommend all of them. The book series “You Don’t Know JS” discussed a lot of things that went over my head though, so I’d recommend the Udemy course “JavaScript: Understanding the Weird Parts” instead if you’re a beginner like me.

It was tough to stay consistent without a linear curriculum to work through, so after a couple months I decided it was time to bite the bullet and enroll in a more robust program that wasn’t as cheap.

Thinkful

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I ended up settling on the full-stack flex program at Thinkful and I’m really glad I did. I’ve been enrolled for about 3 months and it has been great. I meet with a mentor 3 times a week to ask questions and get more in depth explanations of the material — this was definitely the missing component in my studies up until this point. I learn so much just from consistently interacting with someone who has a lot of experience — just getting to see how his brain works when debugging a problem is invaluable.

Thinkful is structured in a very similar way to Viking Code School. There is a text-based curriculum that is split up into different units and lessons. I read through the lessons and do the challenges, and then bring any questions to my mentor session. Each of the three main sections ends with a capstone project, where I get to build something more intensive for my portfolio. Right now I’m working on the second one, which is my first time making a web app using Node and MongoDB. I’m hoping to eventually turn this project into an app on the STEEM blockchain. 🙂

A funny thing that happened since starting the program with Thinkful is that they acquired Viking Code School!

Looking Forward

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So that is what my web development journey looks like so far. 🤓 It has been a ton of fun — I’m so happy to be pursuing this more seriously now.

The coolest part about all of this is that developing this new ability not only gives me a really valuable skill, but it has also unlocked my ability to dream about what I can create. I’m constantly thinking of new things I’d love to build — and now that I’m a part of the Steemit community I can’t help but dream of things I want to create on the STEEM blockchain.

I can’t wait to continue learning about building new things, and I’m curious to see where I’ll be in a few months. I’m hoping to finish the program at Thinkful around the end of March. After that I’ll have 6 months with a career counselor that will help me get a job.

I’ll write some more updates as I progress, including some reviews of the courses I’ve mentioned. I’d love to hear about your own programming journey in the comments! Thanks for reading! 🙂

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