Javascript is considered one of the most popular programming languages and has grown significantly in demand over the last few years. It’s usually the 3rd language to learn on the list for aspiring web developers, after HTML and CSS. A common theme is that these new developers tend to grasp majority of the concepts in HTML and CSS, but encounter major setbacks and road blocks when they begin Javascript.

The reason for this is that HTML and CSS are not considered programming languages but instead are known as markup languages. HTML is used to add the elements to a page or ‘mark up’ and CSS is then used to style them, just like a painter would paint on a canvas. They are languages that are visual and so they’re easier to grasp. Javascript on the other hand, is a programming language which requires the developer to think and define a series of actions that need to be performed. This requires a different way of thinking and so, makes learning Javascript a lot more complicated.

You’re reading this because you’re struggling to grasp the concepts of Javascript and you’re probably wondering whether you’re cut out to be a developer or not. Well, let me tell you that you’re NOT alone! In fact, you’re one of the hundreds of thousands of aspiring developers who arrive at this point in their coding journey, just like I was.

In this article, I’ll show you how to learn Javascript the right way and give you the confidence to push through any set backs you encounter. But first, we need to break down your current negative thought process so we can rebuild you from the ground up.

Your capability

“Am I’m too dumb?” or “Maybe I’m not smart enough to be a developer?” These are 2 common questions new developers ask themselves while learning a programming language. I don’t know you at all, but I can tell you right now — No, you’re not dumb or stupid. You know what you are? Doubtful. You’re questioning your capability and that’s perfectly normal in this situation. But understand this

– Everyone is capable of doing whatever it is they desire if they choose to.

Ask yourself this — if you wake up in the morning and you need to go out, how do you determine based on the temperature, if you need to bring a jacket with you or not? What would be your thought process?

Well, unless you’re a machine or you have no feelings, I’m pretty confident 99.9% of the population would think like this:

‘Ok I better check the weather…

IF it’s cold outside… well then i’ll bring my jacket… otherwise IF it’s not, i’ll just leave the jacket at home.”

If this is you, congratulations! You just performed an IF ELSE statement. You have the capacity to be a programmer!

Your problem isn’t that you’re not capable to code or that you’re not smart enough. Your problem is that you haven’t learnt how to code efficiently yet — either you’re lacking the thought process or you haven’t gained enough experience and put in the time and effort .

The real question to ask yourself is — Am I prepared to put in the work?

Consistency is key

You need to learn consistently, even if it’s a little bit every day, you need to show up and put in the work because learning is progress and it’s a grind. Your brain can’t consume knowledge on its own.

Be patient

This is important. Learning to code in a day is impossible unless you’re Neo from the Matrix. It’s like if you decide to start learning a new spoken language such as French or Japanese, do you think you’ll be speaking fluently in 2 weeks’ time? I strongly doubt it. I lived in Italy in 2004 and it took me 3–4 months, practicing every single day for hours and hours before I even felt comfortable conversing in Italian. You just need to be patient. It’s the same for coding.

Remove any unrealistic expectations

It’s definitely a great idea to pick a time frame and aim for it. Goals are what give us direction. But sometimes it can cause more harm than good, especially if you’ve set an unrealistic expectation, such as learning full stack web development in 2 months or 10 different programming languages in 2 weeks. I’d strongly advise not to base your goal off of other people’s experiences because everyone’s situation is different, which leads me to the next point.

Don’t compare yourself to others

The co-founder of Impact Theory Tom Bilyeu, once tweeted —

“Don’t compare your chapter 1 to some else’s chapter 20”.

Think about that for a second. If you see someone online claim they learnt Javascript in an hour or a week or 2, it’s highly likely they already have coding experience in another language.

So don’t be discouraged! Learning to code for the first time requires you to think in a completely different manner and the concepts always seem very abstract and difficult to visualise. Once you’re familiar with one programming language and you understand the core concepts, it becomes so much easier to learn another one.

A lot of the core concepts are the same or at least very similar. I’m not an expert in linguistics but this can be compared to someone who is fluent in Italian and decides to learn Spanish. The two languages derive from Latin and both contain almost identical rules in grammar and sentence structure.

…

How to learn Javascript

Ok so now that we’ve broken you down piece by piece, it’s time to put you back together.

I’m assuming you’ve just been watching and learning from a tutorial and you’ve either:

a. Just completed the tutorial — you’ve gone off to write some code of your own and you have no idea where to begin

b. You’re currently at the start or the middle of the tutorial and you’re ready to throw your computer out the window because you have no idea what you’ve just learnt and what it means

Well, I’m fairly confident you feel this way because you haven’t actually practiced yet. You’re probably thinking — ‘I just spent 36 hours watching Colt Steele’s web development course on Udemy and followed a long. How can you say I haven’t practiced?’

Settle down. Don’t get your panties in a twist. Let me explain.

You’ve been watching these tutorials and you’ve been coding along, you’ve probably even tried some mini coding challenges or you’ve just fast forwarded those parts (guilty as charged) but in reality, you’re actually not practicing. You’re just getting a view of the fundamentals of the language and you’re being guided through the tutorial. You’re like a baby in one of those baby walker things. Imagine you’re running around the house, back and forth, pasta sauce all over your face, your parents and siblings are cheering you on and your aunty and uncles think you’re adorable. But you take that baby walker away and you fall flat on your ass, you’re not going anywhere kiddo

So how do I learn Javascript then if I can’t have the baby walker

For people who feel they can’t grasp the concepts, go back to the point in the tutorial where you feel like you understand and start from there.

Now say you’re at the point where you’re learning a concept and you don’t understand it at all.

· Don’t move onto the next concept yet. Instead, try and do some external research outside of the tutorial. Say you can’t understand how ‘for loops’ work. Search on Google or Youtube about ‘for loops’ and get insight from a different person. Maybe they explain the concept better.

· Practice the concept on your own. Try writing the ‘for loop’ in your own way. Change the iterator to a different number. Get the ‘for loop’ to work in reverse. Experiment different ways and use the tutor’s guide as a reference. Do this twice, three, four, times or as many times as you need until you start to feel more comfortable. Don’t move on until you’ve done this otherwise, you’re wasting your time.

· If in the tutorial they give you a mini challenge, honestly DO IT! They’re asking you for a reason, not because they’re trying to gain video time in their tutorial in the hopes of generating ad revenue. You need to practice and sometimes you need to take the initiative and practice even more than they suggest. You could even try pausing the video at each concept and try anticipating what they’re going to do next. Practicing on your own is critical

· It’s not a race. Take time to learn and grasp the concepts and make sure you complete the tutorial. Don’t enter tutorial hell where you have 20 unfinished tutorials and you’re looking to buy your next one. Re-do the entire tutorial if you feel you’ve forgotten certain things or you want a refresher. You won’t become a competent developer by rushing through 10 Udemy courses in a span of 2 hours just to show off your certifications on Linkedin. Didn’t your grandma ever tell you — ‘Slow and steady wins the race?’

If you get to a point where you do understand the concepts you’ve learnt but when you go off to code on your own, you have no idea where to start, these tips might help:

· Use pseudocode. Basically, you use comments to break down the problem you’re facing in a series of steps from start to finish. We’ll use the for loop as a basic example of a concept you’re trying to grasp. You could write your pseudocode as follows:
// Initiate the for loop
// define counter
// define condition
// define increment
// define code to be executed

Then you work through each step to create the for loop.

· Understanding syntax is the first step to learning a programming language but this can often feel very abstract for new beginners. Using visual references to explain core concepts can be easier to understand when we can actually visualise it. I remember learning about Javascript arrays and I just couldn’t understand why we would ever need it the real world. It wasn’t until I saw Brad Traversy’s DOM manipulation videos on Youtube that made things really click for me.

How I learn as a self taught freelance developer

Well if you’re wondering my own process and how I personally learn a new language or concept, this is basically it:

· I always start with syntax first, just to get an idea of how the language looks and feels. My go to first is Codecademy because I enjoy the platform but a lot of times, I actually consult the official documentation for that language. In the official docs, they usually have mini tutorial sections which I browse through to see how it all fits together. I also use FreeCodeCamp if I’m still not satisfied or I’ll do a few quick searches on Google.

· Once I’ve explored the syntax and I feel comfortable, I move onto project tutorials which are usually from Youtube. Brad Traversy and The Net Ninja are 2 of my favorite Youtubers. I sometimes buy the occasional Udemy course too.

· I then start building and experimenting on my own. This is the most important step. Sometimes I spend days breaking apart what I’ve learnt to fully understand. For example, I did Brad Traversy’s MERN stack course on Youtube. The project involved a web app where you can create, edit and delete your own daily goals. I ended up reconfiguring the site from a goals app to a travel destinations app using the same CRUD operations. By doing it this way, I spent days focusing on the back end by adding different routes and connecting to MongoDB etc. Then I shifted to the frontend and learnt a tonne on Redux Toolkit. If I had just followed the tutorial from start to finish and then moved on to another tutorial, I’d have no idea what’s going on still.

· I keep track of my progress somehow and so should you! You need to see how far you’ve come from start to now. I’ve had my days where I’ve throw in the towel and I’ve said “I can’t do this anymore. I’m over it. I’m going back to construction!”. But when you get to a point where you compare how much you know now to when you couldn’t even write a simple for loop, you just realise you’ve learnt s much, come so far that quitting just isn’t an option anymore. Any being able to measure that progress will help you push through the hard times. Just having a simple portfolio showing your first shitty projects to the awesome complex projects is a perfect measure. Or even posting once every day on social media and then looking back at your first post from time to time is another good example. You need to measure to help build your confidence.

I hope this article has helped remove that self doubt you have and instead instilled a bit of faith and confidence in your ability to become a developer. If there’s one or two things you should take away from this article:

– Don’t rush through your tutorials! Actually stop and experiment on your own for every task, especially the ones you can’t understand. Don’t move forward until you do otherwise you’ll just waste your time

– Be patient, consistent and don’t give up! Have a break if you have to!
BUT REMEMBER:

Learning to code is like a marathon, not a sprint.

Goodluck and happy coding!