How I Taught Myself to Code in 1 Month: A Guide to Transitioning Your Career and Building a Digital Marketing Business*

So you’ve decided that you want to transition careers or your fresh out of school and have no idea what you want to do. Welcome to the club! I’ve been a stay at home mom for 2 years now, and working for myself as a freelance social media manager. Somewhere around the second year of being home, I decided that I wanted to re-enter the workforce, but in a career that would provide me with the flexibility to work remotely if necessary.

Starts Google Search.......

I had minored in information systems in college and decided that if I was going to reenter the workforce, that I was going to use my background in mental health therapy and transition in to UX Design. The search was overwhelming to be honest, I contacted multiple boot camps to see how each course of study varied, but ultimately spending $10,000 – $20,000 on a boot camp wasn’t in my budget.  After getting a little discouraged about not being able to shell out that type of money for a boot camp, I started to look up job descriptions of positions that I was interested in. I skimmed through dozens of job listings looking for commonalities in the programming languages that employers where looking for. In almost every listing, HTML, CSS and Javascript where listed.

From that moment on I set out to teach myself front end web development in 1 month and here’s how I did it

1. Create your own Syllabus

Remember when I said that I contacted all the top coding boot camps to access their program syllabus? Well I took the course of study from the top three boot camps that I wanted to attend, and created my very own syllabus. Below is an example of the syllabus that I created:

• Week 1:  Intro to Programming & HTML I created several plain and boring websites with just a basic HTML frame work. Since my goal is to transition into UX/ UI  I wanted to make sure that I understood the basics.

• Week 2: CSS Once I learned how to create basic structure of my websites, it was time to add some styling. In walks cascading style sheets (CSS), this tool is essential for making your websites look visually appealing.

• Week 3 & 4: Javascript Javascript was definitely a learning curve for me. I’m still trying to remember everything! It’s one of if not the most common programming language. I’m constantly redoing Javascript lessons just to make sure I fully understand the concepts.

2. Choosing Your Resources

When looking up various coding bootcamps, I came across a plethora of free and low cost coding websites that can teach you how to become a decent junior front end developer.  What I’ve learned is when starting out, if out have a job title in mind, it’s easier to find a coding tutorial website to teach you the necessary skills to obtain that position. Below are the resources that I used:

• CodeAcademy By far one of the easiest sites to get started with when you’re learning how to code. The have a free version, and also a paid version. I did the free 7 day trial of the Pro version to see if I liked how the website laid out the information. They also have tutorials laid out based on career paths, which is helpful. I found their Javascript tutorial to be the most helpful and easy to understand.

• FreeCodeCamp Another great resource, the practice problems and lessons are easy to follow along with. I started out with FreeCodeCamp to learn HTML and CSS.

• Team Treehouse I only used Team Treehouse for the 7 day free trial. I used this resource to learn more advanced CSS styling. During my 7 day free trial, I tested out their Tech Degree to see if I would like it. Its more on the pricey side at $199/per month, but if your looking for a more structured self taught route you may want to look into them!

• Coursea – UX/UI Course Since my goal is to be UX Designer, I wanted to learn as much as possible about the field. The course I took was offered by the California Institute of the Arts and provides you with a great foundation on User Interface (UI) & User Experience (UX) Design. Even if UX/UI isn’t want you want to get into, Coursea has tons of different courses!

Additionally, I binge watched a lot of YouTube videos of self -taught web developers and read articles on Medium and Reddit to see what resources people were using.

3. Create a Schedule

I have young children, so time is of the essence for me. In order to be the most productive I had to create a schedule that allowed me to still get my other work done, be a mom and learn how to code at the same time. In order to acquire a new skill in a short amount of time, you have to be dedicated to it! If you create an schedule, your more likely to stay motivated when you get stuck and want to give up.

4 . Talk to other Developers & Designers

I’m a fairly shy person, so this step was a little difficult for me. But I was serious about learning front end development and breaking into the tech industry. I started searching the terms UX/UI and front end developers on LinkedIn and Instagram. I found a few people that where close to my area and reached out to them to learn about how they transitioned into the tech world.

5. Practice

Once I felt comfortable enough with my skills, I started reaching out to friends and family who needed basic web design or needed updates to their existing websites. Having legit hands on practice, is the best way to test yourself!

That’s how I did it!  Teaching yourself front end development can be trying at times, but you can do it! I definitely stayed up plenty of late nights coding while my kids are sleeping, living on matcha green tea and water.

Learning how to code is a life long journey of learning, trial & error and perfecting your craft. Even if you’re not trying to learn front end development in one month, you can still use this as an outline to get started.

I strongly believe that anyone can learn how to code, the question is do you want to learn?