Cutting Edge CSS and why Paper is Still My Favourite Material

Just released today, my new LinkedIn Learning course Cutting Edge CSS is a complete rethink of how we teach CSS. Here's a sample:

One of the many challenging aspects of learning and using CSS is building a robust mental model for how CSS actually works. This is challenging because CSS is a declarative coding language describing the properties of style to a computer program - so not at all how we humans think about style.

Over the years I've developed my own mental model for CSS using pen and paper, and every time I try to solve a complex CSS problem I start by drafting it on paper to understand what properties I'm manipulating and in what way.

For this course I've translated my mental model into a paper-based visual language to (hopefully) help you develop your own mental model for CSS. The entire course is shot in live action on a table in my office using paper cutouts and a bunch of random tools plus a tiny sprinkling of graphics.

If you came across this picture on LinkedIn or Twitter and wondered what on earth I was doing, now you know the answer:

Inventing new formats for teaching code

Part of my job as a Senior Staff Instructor at LinkedIn Learning is to find new and better ways of helping people make sense of and learn coding for the web. Over the years my teaching style and techniques have evolved and I've introduced new concepts and experiments to improve the learning process for the hundreds of thousands of people who watch my courses world wide.

In early 2021, my colleagues Ray Villalobos and Simon St. Laurent got together to discuss new ways of teaching old things and we converged on an idea: Would it be possible to teach complex coding topics in short bite-size videos formatted to be shared on social media?

Because this was just a concept and we all had a lot of other things to do, I subjected my colleagues to what my students fondly refer to as "unreasonable time constraints" and we set about making one demo each for this concept in one week, start to finish. Here's what I ended up with:

These proofs of concept were successful enough to warrant further ideation, and Ray and I eventually ended up creating two very different courses, of which Cutting Edge CSS is my contribution.

I don't have a date for Ray's course release yet. I'll update this post when it goes live.

The courses are very much a manifestation of Ray and my personalities and work styles: I'm an ultra-minimalist focusing on core concepts, Ray is a maximalist with an expansive imagination and vibrant complexity. Once you see Ray's course you'll know what I mean.

More to come, based on your feedback!

Cutting Edge CSS is in many ways the first step towards new things. As the web evolves and social media creators push the boundaries and standards of what web content is and how learning works, so do we. My dedication and focus is on making the best possible courses for the millions of people around the world who want or need to learn how to publish content on the web, and I'm fully invested in innovating in this space. To push that envelope, I need feedback from you, on old format courses and on new things like this course. So, please watch the course and let me know what you think. Leave a comment on this post, use the feedback feature on LinkedIn Learning, or send me an InMail. I'm here, and I'm listening.

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Morten Rand-Hendriksen is a Senior Staff Instructor at?LinkedIn Learning?(formerly Lynda.com) focusing on?front-end web development and the next generation of the web platform. He is passionate about diversity, inclusion, and belonging and works every day to build bridges between people to foster solidarity. He spends most days trying to figure out how to help people make sense of the web. Design is political. Code is political. Hope is a catalyst.