Those of you who know me well know the story of how I ended up in the 1st grade bottom reading group. Why? I couldn’t pass the teacher’s stupid test. I don’t even remember what was on the test. All I know is that I blew it three times in a row. It wasn’t until one day, when my teacher saw me reading while out in the playground (my mother had been giving me “Peanuts” cartoon collection books to read for age), that I finally got bumped into a much higher level group.
Fast forward to present day Code Academy. Our instructor held a special session on Functions for those of us who are still confused. On the one hand, I was grateful for the in-depth explanation, and it really did help me to understand how they work, what different ones do (or return, as the case may be). Also, many of us were still scratching our heads over parameters vs. arguments, and which variables are global vs. just in the function. I was particularly out to sea as far as how to deal with objects passed to a function. Thanks to her help, I managed to complete the rest of my labs. Granted, it took me a few hours after class to complete everything, but I did it.
On the other hand, it was embarrassing to admit I really needed the extra help—I almost didn’t take up our instructor on the offer to break into a separate group. It is always uncanny that we as human beings have no issue racing to see a doctor for anything physically wrong with us. In fact, for many people my age it’s practically an intramural sport. However, any time we have anything else wrong that’s not below the neck, we consider it a weakness and the height of embarrassing. The whole point of this training is for me to learn how to code. It really shouldn’t matter if I need extra help, as long as I end up as a competent coder who can take on any challenge.
It was still embarrassing, though.
