Currently, I believe that my programming skills have improved in a few ways, which mainly include the processes I use to prepare myself for my assignments and labs, I find that I have a pretty decent process for approaching my work, which includes commenting the instructions and direction I aim for. I find that this helps to determine how my code is written and keeps my mind grounded when I have some problems. It also keeps me on track for the most part when doing any of my work in this class.
In my opinion, I need to improve on a lot of things to improve my programming skills now. I find that a lot of my assignments end with me looking into other people’s code and becoming too engrossed in the way they wrote their code compared to how I normally would write it. A lot of this comes from my weaker coding skills, and I feel like I do not consume enough of the screencasts and don’t engage in enough research which contributes to this reality. I need to focus a lot more on the content of the class and learning enough to be more comfortable with my own approaches, so I can use others’ code to give me inspiration rather than dictate my directions.
I feel that I have indeed learned a lot from the WODs, and that I no longer need the screencasts to complete them. Of course, the screencasts being there were pivotal for me to experiment and build up my skill to become proficient enough to complete them.
The labs definitely helped me to learn a lot of the skills that I used in Assignment1. They helped me to understand most of the skills that I needed to use. Even so, I am not too sure if I would be able to complete them with confidence. Some of the instructions for the labs can be pretty vague and mess up progress on them. Otherwise, the instructions are normally sufficient to complete them.
I feel as if I did learn a lot from my experience in Assignment 1, especially to get started early and not rely on other people’s code as much, other than for inspiration. However, I still feel a little apprehensive for Assignment 2. I will prepare earlier for the assignment, but I am still unsure of my skills and feel like I struggle with finding errors in my code, which make things a lot harder for me.
I personally feel as if the class itself does not need to be improved. Although the labs and wods can be a struggle to complete at times, I still feel as if the content provided by the class is good enough to learn and successfully figure out your own way of learning the code if they are consumed. I myself have not used all of the resources made available to me, which is why my programming skills are weak.
I think that the things that helped me out the most in class was the class website and my classmates. I used my classmates for inspiration and help when I struggled, and the class website contained all of the resources that I needed. Additionally, one of the things that really helped me for Assignment 1 was the one on one help. I got to review a lot of the concepts that I needed to use in my assignment, and got my thought processes back on track for what I needed to do. Even if these were the things that helped me out the most, all of the material was still very useful. The readings were easy to understand, and the quizzes helped to test theorhetical knowledge, but some of the coding based questions had good examples of how the material may be used. The WODs and Labs were also good examples of how to use and apply the new subjects.