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Why does the "learn by building" approach work better for some people than tutorials?
I had a conversation with my coworker Dave last week about how he learned Python. He swears by tutorials and following along step by step, but I learned by just trying to build a simple weather scraper even though I knew almost nothing. Dave said tutorials give him structure, but I felt like I was just copying without really understanding anything. After 3 failed attempts at my project, I finally got it working and it stuck way better than any course I took. Now I'm wondering if there's a type of beginner that fits one method over the other. Has anyone else noticed a clear winner for their learning style?
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the_ben5mo ago
See if Dave can actually code without a tutorial open.
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walker.michael5mo ago
That thing you said about Dave needing a tutorial open really hit home. I read somewhere that some people get stuck in "tutorial hell" where they just follow steps without actually learning how to problem solve. Your failed attempts sound like you actually learned more from those crashes than from a perfect walkthrough. For me, building something broken and fixing it piece by piece is way better than watching someone else do it right. The struggle is what makes it stick, I swear.
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