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CSS

Christopher Jackson
Christopher Jackson
2,597 Points
Posted by Christopher Jackson
Christopher Jackson
2,597 Points

Is it okay for me to criticize here? I have one slight criticism with the CSS Foundations course...

Perhaps it's just my learning style, but I'm having a hard time retaining the information later on in the course. It started off relatively simple, but near the end of the course, I was really struggling to stay focused. Each video just seems to be throwing more and more information and the only stopping points are quizzes.

My gripe here is that there don't seem to be many code challenges. To me, that's where you can really apply all the knowledge you've gained and solidify your knowledge of it.

I thought the "Building a Website" course with Nick Petit was brilliant. Following along with Workspaces while building a site with short (and informative) videos, quizzes, and code challenges was extremely helpful. That course made sure over and over again that you didn't forget the information that was told earlier. However, I do understand that this course is relatively new as the track has been revamped.

I've been a member for a while now, so I also understand that the "CSS Foundations" deep dive was one of the very early courses.

I just want to know, does anyone know if "CSS Foundations" is going to be re-vamped anytime soon? I saw that the HTML deep dive was split into two separate new courses, so is CSS getting the same treatment as well? If it integrated into the functions of the site more it would be absolutely fantastic.

I really love Treehouse, so I hope this isn't treated as hate mail (post).

No hard feelings, hopefully. :-/

Thanks.

EDIT: OR if anyone has any tips on how to best approach the course, I'm all ears.

2 Answers

lovell
lovell
7,882 Points

Christopher,

I think its normal for you to be struggling to retain stuff at the point your at considering the amount of info your taking in. I totally understand your frustrations. After all, you don't want to complete the course and then realise you 'still' cant really code well.

After finishing the videos and realising I still didn't 'get it' I decided to break down the CSS lessons into a kind of 'TO DO' list.

eg:

-Flexbox -grid layout -advanced backgrounds

yada, yada

...and then I'd set myself the challenge of building a simple website using at least one of each thing at a time.

eg WEBSITE 1-must contain the flexbox header. If you get stuck then check out the treehouse video again or compare their code with yours. Keep on doing it until you can code your own flexbox header without checking...or minimal checking.

If you do this and go through your list systematically it'll all start to fall into place. You might have to build 15 sample sites and might have a list of 20 things to perfect, but it'll be worth it.

Also, i'm sure you know this already but don't forget you can download the treehouse code to your desktop by clicking the links under the video.

Finally, I found using a 3rd party code editor worked best for me. Something like notepad++.

Good luck.

Christopher Jackson
Christopher Jackson
2,597 Points
Christopher Jackson
Christopher Jackson
2,597 Points

Thanks, Warren! This is an awesome strategy to really really get good at HTML and CSS. I'll try it out. Still crossing my fingers for the re-vamp, but until then this should help tons.

Atanas Sqnkov
Atanas Sqnkov
14,981 Points
Atanas Sqnkov
Atanas Sqnkov
14,981 Points

Hi Christopher!

I presume that the CSS Foundations course will get a refresh sooner or later.

My advice on your problem is to use the built-in code editor here on Treehouse, or simply open up http://codepen.io/pen or http://jsfiddle.net/ and practice there. You get to write all of your code and inspect it visually in once place. No hassles.

Cheers!