Yesterday on our podcast, Phoebe Voong-Fadel, Frontend Developer at the National Foundation for Educational Research, came on to discuss her journey navigating parenthood alongside a self-taught career in coding.
Before web development, Phoebe also worked for years at various universities in London, while advocating for the use of technology and software to automate repetitive administrative tasks. Apart from her current career at the National Foundation for Educational Research, Phoebe writes articles for freeCodeCamp and mentors early-career developers.
If you didn't get a chance to listen already, find that episode below or wherever you get your podcasts:
Here are some things we took away from our talk with Phoebe that we wanted to share:
As long as you have learned more today than yesterday, you are in good shape!
When you are feeling stuck while learning something, switch up the method by which you are intaking information— like trying out a Youtube video or asking a friend for some advice.
Before you sign up for a boot camp, try some free resources to see if they work for you! Ultimately, see which learning styles work best for you before committing to a paid program, if you can.
Go at your own pace when learning new things and try to avoid comparing yourself to others. You will get there when you get there, and sometimes that means moving slower than other folks! When you compare yourself to others you may also put too much pressure on yourself to learn quicker, not feel good about yourself, or generally waste your energy.
Try again the next day if you don’t do your best at learning something the first day.
If you listened— what are your biggest tips for balancing parenthood, or other large priorities, with learning to code?
Send us your thoughts below and don't forget to give it a listen here or wherever you listen to your podcasts! 💜
Top comments (3)
For real, comparing yourself to others is a one-way ticket to imposter syndrome. Just keep building, breaking and fixing your projects and eventually you'll be golden. When my kid was younger I mostly just drank buckets worth of coffee and worked until I couldn't. Hopefully newcomers have found healthier ways to get their studying in.
The podcast was great and everyone should give it a listen!
My tip would be indoor playgrounds. They typically have wifi and outlets. The facilities usually have one exit/entrance so I feel secure with my kiddo running around without me. Plus being on my laptop means they will know where to find me with the snacks :)
So back in 2020, I decided to get back to being a dev, and get away from being a project manager, which I'd been doing since 2003. Huge knowledge gap, right? To top it off, I'd just separated from my wife, and was doing the single dad thing to two young boys.
The advice I can give you is this:
Life is going to make unplanned/unfair demands of your time -- so on those days, give yourself a little grace. Do what you can with the mindset that some learning for that day is better than no learning at all.
Structure your time. Set bedtimes for everyone, including yourself. Get plenty of rest. Self-care is king. I decided to join the 5 a.m. club and drag myself out of bed at 0500 every day so that I can get stuff done before the kids are up. I spend that time reviewing what I learned the previous day, getting small tasks out of the way so I don't have to do them after work, and generally making sure that my time at the end of the day is as clear as possible.
Get the kids to bed on-time. Meditate for 5-10 minutes and clear your head. Then get down to learning. But honor your bedtime, and get some rest.
It's not a race. No one cares if it takes you 3 months or 2 years to finish that Udemy bootcamp. Just grind it out, learn the stuff, write some independent code along the way to help cement it (a good alternative to the "review what you learned the previous day" part).