In this article I will share the reasons that inspired me to start coding, share my thoughts and feelings and how I overcame the challenges I have faced to date so far. I hope after reading my article you will be inspired to start your coding journey.
My Dreams and Goals
- To become a Front-End Developer
- Be the best Developer I can be for a company and for my own clients
- To become Head of Development in a company
- To increase the number of my own clients and one day be Self-Employed
- Inspire others to code and start their own Journey
Overview and what inspired me into IT and Coding
I discovered I had a passion towards IT I was always asking questions to my Teachers. When I did work experience in an IT company I really enjoyed the experience of leaning different IT terminology and the how powerful IT can be for an organisation. When I was in school when we had a lesson on how to build a website. We had an opportunity to build a website of our choice and I enjoyed the process finding pictures and where to store them properly. I liked to see the website transform in front of my eyes. I picked ICT as a part of my GCSE’s as we would have a more in depth opportunity to build a website and from there on I have always been interested in IT and website building because the product you're building will be seen by the world. We covered basic website design and we learnt how powerful a website can be for an organisation.
My Journey so far
In 2019, I decided what my dream carer would be to be Head of Development for a company and I was committed to learn the skills and knowledge required for me to achieve my goal. I took and online course on Udemy, “The Complete Web Developer”, to learn the basics and from that I started creating my first project, ‘Hello World’. Then I worked my way through the course and it was really enjoyable but also tough at times. I thought the JavaScript was hard and implementing the skills I learnt in the first project was hard at the start and naming Div. Classes and ID in my CSS, but I knew if I dug deep and stayed committed, I knew I would get through the tough times. I had some advice on the course to start building real projects for people, whether it was creating websites for family and friends or for businesses. I asked my hairdresser whether they would like a website and they said yes and I felt it was hard explaining and sharing my ideas for a website for them, but I thought I really excelled my learning and developed more skills and I read the different ways of working agile or sprint. I thought the best way to suit this client would be through agile whether I would regularly meet the owner and show her what I’ve done and discuss more ideas. I had really good feedback from my first ever construction of a website and this was the best feeling ever someone liking what I’ve done. After I had the feedback I had form the Hairdressers of the website they and I done liked it this increased my motivation to become a Front End Developer and look for more clients to increase my portfolio and learn more skills.
The confidence of starting a project and creating a website from start to finish, hosting the website for the client and receiving the positive feedback from the customer gave me the confidence to take on and look for another project to excel my learning further and gain more skills and knowledge. I told myself and others I can see myself doing this as a career being a front-end developer as I enjoy building websites and I like to see the transformation in front of your eyes that the website you are building people around the world will be able to view the website and you may be able to transform or inspire others. Having feedback from other developers is a useful as they can give their opinion, what’s good about your project and they can advise you how you can make it better this will help you take your project to the next level don't feel nervous about asking other developers for feedback because they are there to help. I find twitter useful for asking feedback on my projects and if I need some assistance on something.
I’ve been busy undertaking a course on freeCodeCamp, which has been enjoyable and tough at the same time. I have gained the Responsive Design Certification since undertaking the course and now I’m putting the skills that I’ve learned into my projects. I do find some days tougher than others where my code does not work and you question your ability; that’s the tough part but you dig deep and you remember why you want to be a developer and its important that your motivated and it gets you through the tough days. I find taking regular breaks and looking after you mental health and well-being is extremely important to be able to code with a clear mind.
It's important when you start your coding journey and you do projects for others to know your limitations to your skill-set as the more small projects you can do at the start will build your confidence and skills to allow you to do the bigger more complex projects.
I find doing projects are far better than following a tutorial as you put your knowledge and skills into practice and it challenges your problem solving skills and will ensure you use Google as your friend. I found documenting what I’ve done on Twitter a very useful tool to use to see how far you’ve gone and see what other developers are working on and it’s a way of communicating with other developers.
Currently, I am working on my clients website which ‘ve had engorging feedback from the clients and other developers and I will be starting another website for a client in the near feature. I’ve started building my own website to showcase my projects. In the near future I hope to improve my CSS skills and JavaScript. I cannot believe how much I’ve achieved in this sort space of time I never thought I would have been able to build a website form start to finish for a client. I would like to have reflected on this article in six months to see how far I’ve come and how much I would have achieved again and hopefully I will be a step closer to become a Front End Developer.
"Feature image by Owain Bennett on Unsplash".
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