Learning to Code the Web with Code Year
On January 9th, I received my first unit of Code Year, a one-year, weekly lesson in Javascript programming offered freely by CodeAcademy. A short time later, the Boy and I were working through it together.
Javascript is the programming language on which most of the Web is built, and is one of the simplest coding languages to learn. And, just as natural human languages share most of their basic features with one another (nouns, verbs, adjectives, &c), the elements of Javascript are also used in other programming languages like Perl or Ruby.
Any of you who know me--or who see how rarely I've posted here lately--know that I am pretty extraordinarily busy these days. So why would I take ten minutes, a few evenings per week, to learn something of computer code?
How much of your work is accomplished on the Web or by means of some digital tools or other? Whatever percentage that is, remember that those environments and tools are the way they are because somebody decided that that is how they should be. Learning to code means learning what some alternative possibilities might look like. If we understand something of programming code, we begin to join that community of deciders.
If you are in the Humanities, you may well already be a "Digital Humanist": do you ever use digital tools to accomplish Humanities research? Or, do you ask Humanities-questions about the growing digitalization of our information and our practices? You don't have to code to be a digital humanist, but learning something of how the Web is coded may spark ideas for you about tools or processes that could improve your research and writing.
Do you have kids in school? If they even have "computer class," that's likely to mean, "Learning to use things made by Microsoft," rather than "Learning to build cool things that don't yet exist but could." The weekly units in CodeYear are broken down into several short lessons, perfect for children's lower stamina and shorter attention spans. (Okay, by day's end, my own stamina and attention span are pretty well shot as well.) Sit together on the sofa for ten minutes in the evenings, and learn together the language used to create on the Web.
If you are interested, you can read what others are saying about Code Year, or about Code Academy. But I recommend you just jump right in and sign up for your weekly email lessons. Have fun, and tell me if you decide to get started learning to code.
[Learning to Code the Web with Code Year was written by G. Brooke Lester for Anumma.com and was originally posted on 2012/01/13. Except as noted, it is © 2012 G. Brooke Lester and licensed for re-use only under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0.]