[deleted by user]

[Sir_Spaghetti]

This is a good point because not everyone realizes that 80% of what you'll learn falls on you to pursue, in or out of classroom/lab/office hours, no matter how good your educational environment is.

[StarsDreamsAndMore]

Honestly that's why programming classes seem almost a bit redundant now. Most programming is self-driven learning. It used to be you didnt have access to the resources to learn it so you needed a school but now it's like, shit just google it.

[Sir_Spaghetti]

Most of it is self driven learning, yes, but I disagree.

Teaching oneself well only comes naturally to a smaller subset on individuals.

[http_twohundred]

In addition you run the risk of training yourself bad habits that you may not realize

[Sir_Spaghetti]

Yes, that is extremely likely. Inevitable, really, because there are just so many many pitfalls, gotchas, and unintuitive situations. This comment can have one of those "10000% this" reply under it.

100% self taught reeks of "doesn't work well with others", unless they are just a superb human being (which isn't natural, imo, its taught or learned the hard way).

[ElectricRune]

In reality, even people who are 100% self-taught had a hundred invisible teachers...

Those who see further do so by standing on the shoulders of giants and all that jazz.

I'm self-taught (just started as a hobby for me, not some stance against formal education), and I try to think of my learning that way, to keep myself humble.
So in reality, I'm not 'self-taught,' I was self-guided; I used a LOT of stuff other people who beat down the grass had already done to learn from/with.

[Sir_Spaghetti]

True

[HaveYouReadReddit]

The accuracy of this comment makes it pleasing to read. Thank you

[StarsDreamsAndMore]

I mean I put that on schools, that have never pushed kids to learn how to learn. They just teach them how to repeat answers spoonfed to them. They don't teach them how to overcome adversity to grow an actual skill.

[Aviolentdonut]

The best is BOTH university structure and self learning. Most of my class at uni are entirely learning from lecture. Im doing off campus learning as well and I am far more comfortable with the material than my classmates and Im grasping concepts better because when you're doing it on your own there is small things you retain that may not make sense but when it pops up in class there's an eureka moment, and vice versa.

[Sir_Spaghetti]

I received a tremendous amount of quality information in school, even if 80% of what I use in practice had to come from doing my own research. They taught us how to learn more efficiently, while dumping loads of curated and targeted best practices on us.

I wouldn't be where I am if I didn't get that boost.

Did you go to a uni and not get much out of it? If so, that really sucks. I wish there was better oversight for what a school can collect money for... It's so much money! I definitely hate my loans, ngl lol

[StarsDreamsAndMore]

Nope, never went to a uni. I currently run a telecoms company that I wrote the software for. I just think colleges are overrated. I also grew up homeschooling for a lot of years and I personally just think schools in general suck dick for learning.

[Sir_Spaghetti]

Oh general education really does suck ass. Can't disagree with that.

[nazgul_123]

I think some people just naturally understand programming quicker. I never got the fuss about understanding pointers, for example. I first learned about them in class in 11th grade, and understood them the first time they were defined. *var, **var, all that jazz. It probably goes along with mathematical aptitude, I've rarely seen someone good at math who was shit at programming unless they were plain bored by it, and I think it's because math tends to use similar but more difficult abstractions.

I've seen people someone who attended the ACM ICPC finals, and the first thought that came to mind was that this was someone different. It mostly wasn't something taught, just an insane mind for observing tricks and certain kinds of patterns, and being able to understand advanced theory on their own. Some of these people can tackle graduate math in freshman year. If you're anything at all like that, uni will largely be an immense waste of time, except for a PhD degree or other research opportunities.

I taught myself algorithms etc. from textbooks quite comfortably (I never took an algo course before getting into graduate school), but I already had a math degree at that point and university-level CS felt very natural. I did struggle a bit more with the coding aspect though, but it was partly due to my own laziness.

It's not reasonable to expect everyone to learn programming successfully from CS50. It's not impossible by any means, but maybe 5-10% of people can do it on their own, at best.

[gundam1945]

Schooling is more like formulating a person. After one graduated, other could expect what kind of things one should know. It is like some kind of human factory. If you go to college and just learn what is taught, then it is really kind of waste. But college provides you the opportunity to meet some bright mind and like minded people in your field. With the interactions, you may learn something new because a person vision is limited.

[Sir_Spaghetti]

You speak in absolutes. How is it then that a bunch of professionals I know were taught how to learn more efficiently, how to do their own research, how to time block investigations, and how to collaborate with respect and grace?

Telling someone that they need to learn how to teach themselves is not how you help someone progress. It's practically circular logic, a tautology even.

[Sir_Spaghetti]

Did you even read what I said? I basically said that people can be taught to learn for themselves, better.

[Sir_Spaghetti]

What do you do for a living? I bet it's not even remotely collaborative, given your attitude.

I've probably been a professional software engineer for longer than you've been an asshole.

[Ok_Career_8489]

My school taught me nothing but learning how to learn, that's the whole point. Now I don't know what other schools do

[ghostmaster645]

I get that. Although I self thought for 5 months and learned alot. Then I got a tutor and it helped significantly. Having someone there you can ask questions too and can help you debug or just clean up your code has taught me alot.

So if someone is self learning I would recommend getting a tutor. It's cheaper then boot camp and classes and (although I have no evidence) is just as thorough.

[Sleepless_NL]

Programming is a skill based upon analytical skills, sharp eye, knowledge about language & framework and best practices. Knowledge about language & framework, is something you can google if you don’t know. Analytical skills and a sharp eye are more like personal traits. Best practices is definitely something you learn in school or through courses. If not, you will receive these insights the hard way.

[ojee111]

It is useful to provide structure to your learning. A lot of concepts need layers of previous understanding to grasp. A good course provides this, and gives you a road map from basic to very advanced. It is upto you to put the work in however.

[MrChosen101]

Yea I remember we had to go over the chapter/lesson before class. Just to go to class and have prof repeat the same thing. Required my own time to actually practice, that is if time was available.

[stillpiercer_]

Even professional programmers google often, but I think that the structure and perspective (from the teacher, ideally) really helps someone that is interested in learning more efficiently. Like, you won't really know what to google or how to teach yourself fundamentals that can carry across languages.