Having a mentor helps you grow much faster than just consuming a book or video. Insightful feedback pushes you to learn faster. Mentors have long been a strength of the coding community.
Except for those of us who don't work in a coding shop, or we're doing a language/skill no one at work knows or cares about. IRC is good for fast answers but not as helpful for long term growth.
A few years ago I ran a "90 Day Wonder" mentoring program. We took a book and worked through it together. Since I wasn't a subject matter expert I enlisted smarter people to help. A 90 day timeframe made it easier to wrap up quickly. It also meant mentors knew when they could relax the time commitment.
I've put notes and lessons learned in the docs directory on GitHub:
Are any of you advanced Rubyists interested in running a "90 Day Wonder" effort on some aspect of Ruby?
Thanks for sharing this! I just checked the repo and the idea looks exciting, I would love to participate in one about ruby testing (unit testing, integration testing). What do you think ?
Youssef.
···
On Dec 18, 2017, 11:10 AM +0000, Leam Hall <leamhall@gmail.com>, wrote:
Having a mentor helps you grow much faster than just consuming a book or
video. Insightful feedback pushes you to learn faster. Mentors have long
been a strength of the coding community.
Except for those of us who don't work in a coding shop, or we're doing a
language/skill no one at work knows or cares about. IRC is good for fast
answers but not as helpful for long term growth.
A few years ago I ran a "90 Day Wonder" mentoring program. We took a
book and worked through it together. Since I wasn't a subject matter
expert I enlisted smarter people to help. A 90 day timeframe made it
easier to wrap up quickly. It also meant mentors knew when they could
relax the time commitment.
I've put notes and lessons learned in the docs directory on GitHub:
Thanks for sharing this! I just checked the repo and the idea looks
exciting, I would love to participate in one about ruby testing (unit
testing, integration testing). What do you think ?
I'd love to dive into Rspec at some time but currently it seems
unrealistic to invest the time for me on top of the supporting and
moderation effort I put into a large German Ubuntu portal. Sorry.
···
On Mon, Dec 18, 2017 at 12:50 PM, Youssef Idmoussi <youssef.idmoussi@gmail.com> wrote:
On Dec 18, 2017, 11:10 AM +0000, Leam Hall <leamhall@gmail.com>, wrote:
Having a mentor helps you grow much faster than just consuming a book or
video. Insightful feedback pushes you to learn faster. Mentors have long
been a strength of the coding community.
Except for those of us who don't work in a coding shop, or we're doing a
language/skill no one at work knows or cares about. IRC is good for fast
answers but not as helpful for long term growth.
A few years ago I ran a "90 Day Wonder" mentoring program. We took a
book and worked through it together. Since I wasn't a subject matter
expert I enlisted smarter people to help. A 90 day timeframe made it
easier to wrap up quickly. It also meant mentors knew when they could
relax the time commitment.
I've put notes and lessons learned in the docs directory on GitHub:
Are any of you advanced Rubyists interested in running a "90 Day Wonder"
effort on some aspect of Ruby?
Thank you for sharing that! Do I get that right that mentor and mentee
decide themselves how they interact? Or is the interaction always in
this IRC group meeting?
I ran IRC to give us a real time feedback session. My target was getting people to try C programming so they were more likely to be helped by an on the spot thing than a puzzle to solve. The initial learning curve for things can be steep. We had several learners so it was useful to get together as a group.
Take your rspec idea for example. Someone has to know at least a little Ruby to make rspec work well, so they are a little up the learning curve. How you and the mentee(s) interact is up to both sides though. IRC might replicate pair programming at distance while e-mail might allow deep introspection on the problem at hand.
Make sense?
Leam
···
On 12/18/2017 06:55 PM, Robert Klemme wrote:
Good night!
Are any of you advanced Rubyists interested in running a "90 Day Wonder"
effort on some aspect of Ruby?
Thank you for sharing that! Do I get that right that mentor and mentee
decide themselves how they interact? Or is the interaction always in
this IRC group meeting?
i've started to like teaching, done a rails girls summer, even a few courses (bootcamp style). Even i've been coding ruby since 2001, i still learn, currently vue (recommended). I also know rails, rspec and that whole area. So i guess i could mentor.
That said i am not fully understanding what you are proposing. The docs seemed about c, and who is being mentored ?
Torsten
···
Leam Hall <mailto:leamhall@gmail.com>
18 December 2017 at 13.12
Having a mentor helps you grow much faster than just consuming a book or video. Insightful feedback pushes you to learn faster. Mentors have long been a strength of the coding community.
Except for those of us who don't work in a coding shop, or we're doing a language/skill no one at work knows or cares about. IRC is good for fast answers but not as helpful for long term growth.
A few years ago I ran a "90 Day Wonder" mentoring program. We took a book and worked through it together. Since I wasn't a subject matter expert I enlisted smarter people to help. A 90 day timeframe made it easier to wrap up quickly. It also meant mentors knew when they could relax the time commitment.
I've put notes and lessons learned in the docs directory on GitHub:
Thank you for sharing that! Do I get that right that mentor and mentee
decide themselves how they interact? Or is the interaction always in
this IRC group meeting?
I ran IRC to give us a real time feedback session. My target was getting
people to try C programming so they were more likely to be helped by an on
the spot thing than a puzzle to solve. The initial learning curve for things
can be steep. We had several learners so it was useful to get together as a
group.
Makes sense, especially if you are close time zone wise. The timing
shown in the documentation would not work for me though as I am in
CET.
Take your rspec idea for example. Someone has to know at least a little Ruby
to make rspec work well, so they are a little up the learning curve. How you
and the mentee(s) interact is up to both sides though. IRC might replicate
pair programming at distance while e-mail might allow deep introspection on
the problem at hand.
In this case I would be the mentee, I guess, but yes.
Make sense?
Absolutely! I was just curious how you handled it with your C project.
Cheers
robert
···
On Tue, Dec 19, 2017 at 2:42 AM, Leam Hall <leamhall@gmail.com> wrote:
The project I ran was about beginner level C. My best skill is "instigating"; I do that much better than I code.
There are at least two different ways to come into this. The first is a mentor led project. Someone who is good at "X" says "I would do a 90 day mentoring relationship on X, is anyone interested?"
The other way, and the one I did, was say "I'm interested in subject X and will be using book Y to learn. It anyone interested in joining me?" Since I was not a C expert but trying to relearn C from years ago, I asked a couple programmers to watch over us and be ready to answer questions I could not.
There is a good bit of motivation being in a group with the same focus. The documents I shared are the lessons learned from the project. My hope is that someone else will be helped, and encouraged to help others learn.
Leam
···
On 12/19/2017 03:56 AM, Torsten wrote:
Hi Leam,
i've started to like teaching, done a rails girls summer, even a few courses (bootcamp style). Even i've been coding ruby since 2001, i still learn, currently vue (recommended). I also know rails, rspec and that whole area. So i guess i could mentor.
That said i am not fully understanding what you are proposing. The docs seemed about c, and who is being mentored ?
Torsten
Leam Hall <mailto:leamhall@gmail.com>
18 December 2017 at 13.12
Having a mentor helps you grow much faster than just consuming a book or video. Insightful feedback pushes you to learn faster. Mentors have long been a strength of the coding community.
Except for those of us who don't work in a coding shop, or we're doing a language/skill no one at work knows or cares about. IRC is good for fast answers but not as helpful for long term growth.
A few years ago I ran a "90 Day Wonder" mentoring program. We took a book and worked through it together. Since I wasn't a subject matter expert I enlisted smarter people to help. A 90 day timeframe made it easier to wrap up quickly. It also meant mentors knew when they could relax the time commitment.
I've put notes and lessons learned in the docs directory on GitHub:
Makes sense, especially if you are close time zone wise. The timing
shown in the documentation would not work for me though as I am in
CET.
Depends. I am in the "Robert -6" timezone so either you could break for lunch if work allows, or I could. It really depends on the group composition. If it is one on one or if there are several people.
Take your rspec idea for example. Someone has to know at least a little Ruby
to make rspec work well, so they are a little up the learning curve. How you
and the mentee(s) interact is up to both sides though. IRC might replicate
pair programming at distance while e-mail might allow deep introspection on
the problem at hand.
In this case I would be the mentee, I guess, but yes.
Make sense?
Absolutely! I was just curious how you handled it with your C project.
Remember, I was the instigator, not the expert! For something like rspec you could pick a good book as the focus and see who else was interested. If you want a beginner group then focus on the first chapters of the book. Or an intermediate group could look at the reference docs and come up with a plan of study. It would be useful to get someone who is really good at rspec to help out without them having to lead.
Of course, I like books, which is why I focus on that. Another option is to take a section of Ruby that you're interested in but seems to need tutorials and documentation. Spend 90 days digging into that subject and writing things others can use to learn.
Remember, I was the instigator, not the expert! For something like rspec you could pick a good book as the focus and see who else was interested. If you want a beginner group then focus on the first chapters of the book. Or an intermediate group could look at the reference docs and come up with a plan of study. It would be useful to get someone who is really good at rspec to help out without them having to lead.
Of course, I like books, which is why I focus on that. Another option is to take a section of Ruby that you're interested in but seems to need tutorials and documentation. Spend 90 days digging into that subject and writing things others can use to learn.
I just bought Search which comes highly recommended and I'm definitely up for going through this or another rspec resource with other people.
I will note that almost everyone who has commented has mentioned rspec in some form or fashion. Any rspec subject matter experts available?
Leam
···
On 12/19/2017 05:03 PM, Ketan Patel wrote:
Remember, I was the instigator, not the expert! For something like rspec you could pick a good book as the focus and see who else was interested. If you want a beginner group then focus on the first chapters of the book. Or an intermediate group could look at the reference docs and come up with a plan of study. It would be useful to get someone who is really good at rspec to help out without them having to lead.
Of course, I like books, which is why I focus on that. Another option is to take a section of Ruby that you're interested in but seems to need tutorials and documentation. Spend 90 days digging into that subject and writing things others can use to learn.
I just bought Search which comes highly recommended and I'm definitely up for going through this or another rspec resource with other people.
