Yesterday on Oct 1, 2018, I braced myself for the 1st coding challenge out of 21. As I opened my browser, I had no idea what to expect. All I knew was that each challenge was supposed to take around 20-30 minutes, so in preparation for that, I had blocked out a big chunk of time in my calendar to tackle it. I was worried that for a beginner like me with limited coding experience, I’d have no idea how to approach it.

When I looked at the Challenge #1, read the instructions and scanned the given code, I was like “um what the heck!! I will never figure this out!!” but then suddenly, it was like all the coding-related knowledge that rested in the deep crevices of my mind suddenly came forward in my brain. I saw functions and arrays and loops swirl around me and felt like I was having a moment that resembled the one the math lady meme had.

And then, I felt a brief moment of clarity. It took me only two minutes to solve… I was shocked at how much code I actually had in me! Who would have thought! I will admit that I did do some Googling as a refresher for some concepts but really what developer doesn’t Google? Google is and should be everyone’s best friend so #noshame in that. I was just happy to realize that maybe I retained more than I thought I did in the short amount of time that I’ve been learning how to code. It felt SO good to be able to rack my brain for the JavaScript tools that I knew I had at my disposal, and use them to solve the problem.

All in all, I found Day 1 of the 21DCC to be a great JS essentials recap for beginners. If you’re super new to coding, I’d recommend reading up on Arrays to tackle the first challenge (yay, free hints!). Also know that Google is here for you and so is the 21DCC forum!

So, Day 1: so far so good! However, I know that the worst has yet to come and it’ll only get harder from here. But for now, I’m going to enjoy the sweet sweet feeling of running the right code (even if it was a really basic one).

I’m ready to take on Day 2 today! Be back to tell ya all about it tomorrow B-)

Thanks for reading! If you haven’t joined the 21DCC yet, it’s not too late!! Head on over to https://coding-challenge.lighthouselabs.ca and join me! 

-Rachel