Learning how to make a chocolate teapot
I'll often say I'm immune to improvement. And I'm only half joking. Not very good at this learning business. Despite that, I keep trying to learn new stuff. That's not the point of this post, just a foundation for it.
It's on my mind because I've been doing some stuff on Codecademy (don't come for my choices, that's not the point here).
So I was doing a course on Codecademy navigating around folders using the terminal. Except... Why would I do that? I can just click? It was not selling me on the why. I assume there is a reason I would want to do things in the terminal, but this was not it.
From a pedagogical point of view I understand it is tricky because when someone is starting to learn you have to teach them simple stuff. But if it's too simple - like going into folders and looking at what's in them - that's not representative of what (I assume) the terminal can do or is good for. So I've 'learnt' how to make a chocolate teapot. And I'm still no closer to understanding the terminal, or why I might want or need to understand the terminal.
Similarly, Duolingo. Everyone always says Duolingo for learning a language. Not the immersion nerds on youtube, but in my life. And I hate Duolingo. I hate Duolingo because I don't want to know how to say I am a horse. Why do I need to know this? So that's why I don't use Duolingo. Irrelevance.
I'm not against making chocolate teapots! I've had a lot of fun making chocolate teapots! I have a motto. If something is worth doing it's worth doing badly. But by this I do not mean getting frustrated about command lines.