Zhus on First

[learning cs] thinking

1 month into my Masters in computer science program at UPenn for career switchers, the hardest part of it all has been the exhaustion of thinking.

Yes, the assignments are long, and I'm expected to apply new concepts to new situations immediately. Yes, I'm bad at LaTex for my math assignments. Yes, I don't know enough Python PEP or syntax.

There's never enough time. I'm juggling work and everything else.

And I'm a slow thinker:

  1. i need to doodle, to write, to draw
  2. i really want to know the why and how and what if
  3. i need to pace
  4. i need to talk it out

And through it all, the best tool to help me think and break down my thoughts into discrete steps for a proof or a code block, is:

pen and paper.

Use pen and paper to do all those slow thinking things.

Use pen and paper to break down thoughts into discrete, iterative steps for a proof or a code block.

I honestly belief that the best computer science intro classes is done all in pen and paper. No typed code until second year.

Of course, gen ai is replacing the thinking.

So, who needs more scratch paper?

#learning_cs