Escaping Tutorial Hell: steps on how to escape and avoid ๐Ÿ’€๐Ÿ”ฅ๐Ÿ‘ฉ๐Ÿฝโ€๐Ÿ’ป

"Knowledge is of no value unless you put it into practice " ~ Unknown

Intro

so you are trying to learn how to code? watching tutorials seems like the most sensible path to take, so you spend time watching tons of tutorials and copying code upon code until you realize, you can't create any meaningful code of your own(depressing right?๐Ÿ˜ž), this is what we call TUTORIAL HELL๐Ÿ’€. Don't get me wrong tutorials are super helpful, but you need to know how to use them effectively.

Tips for avoiding tutorial hell("effective tutorialing ")

So let's look at ways to ensure the tutorials we take are effective :

  1. - Commit to one: this is VERY important when learning to code, pick ONE good tutorial and stick with it till the end. Don't try juggling multiple tutorials at the same time as tempting as it may be. Stick to one at a time give it your full attention and complete it.

  2. -Don't just copy code, UNDERSTAND! : most times when creating projects from tutorials, we end up mindless lifting code without knowing what exactly it does. This problem can be easily solved with โœจGoogleโœจ; so hit the pause button and search for that strange code and understand how it works, after all the purpose of taking any tutorial is to learn.

  3. -Add your special touch to tutorial projects: after taking tutorials it is important to apply what you have learnt in your very own project, but it is understandable if starting a new project from scratch seems scary. A nice way you can start is by tweaking the project from the tutorials and experimenting a little till you are confident enough to start your project from scratch.

  4. -PRACTICE, PRACTICE, PRACTICE: this the the most obvious yet important way to ensure you get the very best from any tutorial.

HOW TO ESCAPE? (steps to get unstuck)

so you find yourself stuck in the infamous"TUTORIAL HELL๐Ÿ’€", and want to get out, these steps should help :

  1. -STOP taking tutorials: you need to break the cycle and just stop. sounds simple enough right?

  2. -Try creating a simple project: search on Google for the most basic thing you can create with the language you are trying to learn and give it a go if you ever get stuck, you can get help from โœจGoogleโœจ and various developer communities like StackOverflow, Hash-node, GeeksforGeeks, etc. It would be like putting pieces of a puzzle together, which helps your reasoning and is more fun than just copying code.

  3. -Practice "effective tutorialing": I know I said stop tutorials, but they are helpful, once you have been able to create a project yourself and successfully escaped TUTORIAL HELL๐Ÿ’€ you can work on developing a healthy relationship with tutorials, by practising what I call "effective tutorialing"(explained in the heading above)

    Thanks for reading :)

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Written by

Oluwatofunmi Otuneye
Oluwatofunmi Otuneye