Week 2 - Pythons and Turtles (6th April) ?????? ??????

I sat down yesterday to review my notes for the week and realised that I have covered an amazing volume of new ideas in a pretty short space of time. This week I moved from HTML and CSS to Python and from the outset, I was really exited about what that would involve. I read a lot about the power and utility that Python has a programming language and I was curious to see why. 

Pythons and Turtles

We started using a module called Turtle that I understand is a popular way for introducing programming to kids. And I can see why - it’s a relatively straightforward way of playing around with some foundational ideas in a way that provides instant, visual feedback. I won’t go into the details here but I have spent a lot of time in the last week importing modules, creating assignment statements, writing method calls and running for loops to create a load of really cool looking shapes. Here are a few of my favourites.

#TerrytheTurtle

Reflections

I am really enjoying my commitment to learning at the moment and if there is one thing that has dramatically improved this week, it is my note taking. I am covering a lot of new information in a short space of time and the content is also getting steadily harder. I realised that I needed to do something to help me encode and recall all this new info in a way that was more effective.

I was given a Rocketbook for Christmas and it has been a real game changer for me as a I try to capture and then review the key points that come up. I am using Evernote to capture screen shots and keep a record of the lessons that don’t make total sense but I am using hand written notes to capture the things that seem important in the moment. This has made my progress much slower than the previous week but it has also given me more collateral to refer back to at the beginning and the end of the day.

Last week, I talked about activating schemata and how I start each day by asking myself “what happened yesterday?”. This is something that I am going to stick with but I have also found it helpful as part of the process to encode new ideas to do the same thing at the end of every day too. The courseware in Udacity is entirely asynchronous and while that that has made this programme possible for me because I need to do it in my own time, it has also made it harder to stay on top of what I am doing day to day. The days seem to blur into each other due to the volume of work and the speed I am taking it on and I am more and revisiting the content in a handful of different formats is something that I think will pay dividends in the long run.

That’s it for this week.

Alex