Why Everyone Should Learn How to Code

Why Everyone Should Learn How to Code

Every day, tons of people get into programming because they love the excitement of computers and being able to make something of their own. Even if you don’t want to become a programmer as a career, it’s still worth learning how to program. Not only is programming fun, it is one of the best things you can do to improve your life.

Many people believe that learning a new programming language is extremely hard and requires a lot of time, but really it’s not as hard as you think. Learning a new programming language is much easier than learning a new speaking language for instance. Everything you need to start learning you can likely find for free on the internet such as video tutorials, articles talking about the best practices, and even new and upcoming websites that are totally dedicated to teaching a new user how to program. Although creating something like Facebook or Twitter might require a little more programming experience, you might want to start off creating something simple. Take something that you do every day or very frequently and, by using the coding skills you learn, find a way to make a more efficient way of doing it.

Here’s a good example: one of my friends is a video editor for a company and he spends a good amount of his day organizing dozens of video and audio files. He then creates dozens of folders by the certain video/audio type as part of the organization process. He decided to take a programming course in Python and along with a little more research created a really simple program that makes all the folders for him and takes the files and organizes them into their respectful categories. A daily task that normally would take a couple hours now takes him only minutes to complete. Remember he is not a professional programmer, but he dedicated the time to learn Python, which made his life a little easier.

You don’t need to dedicate your life to programming to add it to your career. The easiest languages to start learning are HTML and CSS, Python, Javascript, and Ruby. One of the best places to start learning a new language is TeamTreehouse, a leading online education provider. Treehouse seeks to help coders become great by providing a rich library of over 600+ videos organized into specific learning tracks, along with interactive quizzes and code challenges. Treehouse provides deep and high quality training in HTML, CSS, Javascript, User Experience, as well as Back-End development in Ruby, iPhone and Android applications. Treehouse costs $25/month (subscription) to use with all its amazing content, but it’s totally worth it. If you are looking for something less expensive and you don’t want to have to pay to learn how to code then Codecademy is for you. Codecademy is free and is committed to building the best learning experience inside and out, making this the one of best places for you to learn, teach, and create the online learning experience you need. Some of the programming languages you can learn here include HTML, CSS, JQuery, PHP, Python, and Ruby.

There are many different education platforms and tools to make learning how to program software and mobile apps easier. You may discover that you really enjoy coding and might want to become a software developer. An experienced developer can earn more than $100,000+ a year.It wouldn’t be too bad of a skill to master.

Zach Amrein is a rising Sophomore at High Point University in NC, majoring in Computer Science. He graduated from Trinity High School in Louisville, KY and played lacrosse all 4 years. In his spare time, he likes to learn new programming languages, swim, play basketball with friends and enjoys long vacations in the bahamas.