Programming for me has always been a staple in my high school life. It is something that heavily interests me and something that I want to implement in my future career. CAS has given me an opportunity to finally start learning Python, which is probably one of the most popular and must-know programming languages. Python in particular appeals to me because of how it possesses the potential to do almost any task. Specifically, Python is the language that is usually used when programming AI and machine learning algorithms which is a field that I am drawn to because of its potential. The recent release of art AIs such as stable diffusion only worked to enforce this fascination.
I believe that programming is one of my strengths because of my indulgence in logical analysis and critical thinking. At the same time, however, I struggle to remember specific syntaxes which is a relatively important skill needed while coding. Choosing Python meant that the syntaxes would get much simpler. What I didn’t anticipate was that my problem wouldn’t be remembering syntaxes but rather remembering which syntax went into which language. My previous practice with JavaScript which, before Python, was the only language that I knew(apart from HTML CSS). Because of this, I struggled with recalling the syntaxes for Python since they often got muddled with JavaScript. I finally overcame this challenge by simply practicing Python over and over again through online services. Constantly developing in this field is very important to me on a personal level since programming is something I have been interested in ever since 7th grade. Expanding upon this knowledge and overcoming my weaknesses is almost a requirement for me.
The best tool I found for practicing Python was DataCamp through which I learned and initially practiced Python. After which, in order to develop my logical thinking and use of Python I started practicing on LeetCode. At first, I attempted the same problems that I had already completed with JavaScript. Later on, to finally overcome my weakness with syntaxes and to call at least the basics of Python learned, I started doing new problems. LeetCode I found to be a very effective tool to help me overcome my weaknesses while simultaneously developing my strengths.
Overall, learning Python was a very insightful experience in learning new programming languages because I struggled with the existing knowledge I had of JavaScript. Nevertheless, this is just the beginning of the journey, since I will definitely be deeply engaging in programming throughout my college career.
