Read through the following. Write down five things that you learned from reading this. Write down five things that you plan to change about yourself when taking this class.
- If you feel you can't complete the work talk to your instructors and we can figure out a way for you to turn in something meaningful.
- There is always a solution, you just need to ask for guidance / support when you need it.
- You'll just fall further behind
- Office hours are a great place to ask clarifying questions and ‘catch up’ outside of class time
- The class recordings and the notion provide resources relevant to the labs/homework.
- Avoid Youtube explainers and online tutorials when working through the HW / Labs. They can often confuse you more because of variety of approaches / options you can find online.
- Notes are meant to be a reference for later, they are not a step by step guide, focus on the big picture during the lesson.
- All of this material is online. You could teach all of it to yourself, but it's incredibly difficult. We aim provide you a broad, yet focused approach.
- You're here to have us around to answer your questions. Make sure to utilize your instructors.
- Traditional schooling teaches us if we don't understand something, it's our fault. This is not the case at GA.
- If you don't understand something, there are others who feel the same way, it takes time and repetition to fully understand a new concept.
- Students will get together and support each other in zoom breakout rooms
- Students get so involved they forget to eat
- One student was riding her bike, had someone open a car door in front of her, flipped over her bike and the door, got up, and continued biking to class
- One student was involved in a car accident, hospitalized, discharged, and still made it to class on time
- Almost no one will bring you in for an interview because you went to a bootcamp
- The education you gain is what GA gives you a chance to show that you can learn quickly.
- In reality, most devs who interview you will go into the interview believing you're unqualified due to a lack of experience
- Your ability to problem solve on the spot and talk thoughtfully about your code is going to be what changes their minds
- What might have worked for you in one class might not work here
- Think about how you learn and be aware of what works/doesn't work
- Don't compare yourself with other students. This is not school, where everyone comes in with roughly equivalent experience
- Change your voicemail to let people know you will not be able to respond immediately
- Set auto-reply to email to let people know you will not be able to respond immediately
- Deactivate social media
- Turn off your phone / group chats during class time and while doing homework
- Check your homework by figuring out ways to test your answers to see if they are correct.
- You should be able to answer the question "did I do it right?" on your own.
- In the real world, you'll need to figure out how to test your code to see if it works. You won't have someone to read your code and tell you if you did it right.
- Learning to do your own research and ask (and google) specific questions is essential.
- Try to create a relationship with all other students.
- You don't know when you'll need a second set of eyes. Sometimes bugs are really simple and can be spotted by anyone.
- It's like writing an essay where your eyes know what you're trying to say and don't see mistakes
- Finding a job has a lot to do with timing, what the employer needs vs what the student wants to do, and personality matches.
- It's never the “best” students that get jobs first. Rather, the group who gets jobs first will contain a diverse set of students.
- A big group of developers have a big network. They know your work and are your biggest champions.
- This group of students who get jobs first are often a way into a company for othere, so be friends with everyone. You never know who is might my land a job and then offer you a recommendation or mention their company is hiring.
- You can learn a lot about by asking questions about the code
- Helping is not providing the solution, but asking questions and testing assumptions about the code
- Lab time and project time is community bonding time. Help each other out.
- These times offer a chance to simulate the real world and see where you need improvement; lab time is where you'll get a lot of practice with researching and debugging.
- Learning how to debug your own code and read documentation/articles/forums takes practice. This is not really something that can be taught.
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Try not to fixate on the results of your current task - you'll succeed more and have more fun.
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different types of fixed mindsets. Monitor your reactions for these feelings:
growth mindset
- believe that ability can be learned
- each setback or blocker is an opportunity
- is okay with being wrong in order to get better
fixed mindset
- thinking ability is something you're born
- “You’re Wrong I Rule”: person is unable to accept that they did something wrong
- “You’re Right I Suck”: any criticism immediately sends person into feeling like they're worthless
- “Blame it On The Rain”: any mistake a person makes is explained away by circumstance. The person believes this won't happen again, so there's no need to correct the issue
- “Optimist Without a Cause”: criticism is not important, given everything else that went well
- Ultimately, the only thing that matters is, "does it work?"
- Code "quality" (how you write code) doesn't matter as an early-career developer. Only your ability to solve problems matters
- Programming is like writing an essay in a language you don't know. The hard part is knowing what you want to say and then research how to say it Come up with the solution to a problem on your own and then research any syntax you might need in order to implement it.
- We teach you to teach yourself and provide hints along the way. This will be your life when you start work, most of development is coming across something you've never seen and figuring it out on your own.
- Always try to work independently, but don't let problems/questions of any kind (programming or personal) fester. Bring them up immediately to an IA or an IL, we are always here to help.
- The chances that you'll be using the exact tech we teach you is slim even though we pick popular tech to teach:
- tech changes, concepts don't, focus on understanding the fundamentals deeply and the specifics will change / evolve from stack to stack
- Projects and grades are not as powerful as being able to explain code. The education and the breadth of knowledge you gain from projects, homework, labs, however is what will provide you a solid foundation from which to dive-deeper.
- Your interviewers will be more impressed if you can answer their questions, can engage deeply with each question and talk thoughtfully about your code.