Curriculum Order

freeCodeCamp Support
1

The Curriculum sometimes seems out of whack/out of order. I’m pretty new to some languages and the lessons can be like hitting a wall.

Is this the proper place to give suggestions? I am happy to give suggestions on how to improve, but I need to know how and where to do it.

Here is an example of what I am talking about.

In the last few days, I did all of the “Basic JavaScript” challenges. Then, I started in on the ES6 challenges and I hit this challenge: Write Higher Order Arrow Functions. I had no idea how to do the challenge. When I looked at the “Hint” it told me that I would need the filter() and map() functions. The filter() and map() functions had not been in the “Basic JavaScript” curriculum and do not appear in the curriculum until several other modules later. That is, they aren’t taught until “Functional Programming”-- 6 full modules later.

  • Basic Javascript
  • ES6 <— has a challenge with filter() and map() required
  • Regular Expressions
  • Debugging
  • Basic Data Strctures
  • Basic Algorithm Scripting
  • Object-Oriented Programming
  • Functional Programming <----- filter() and map() introduced here.
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2

Well since this is a curriculum order thread I will post my thoughts here!

First I do agree with AaronFW those should kind of switch places or be rethought some how.

But to my thought!

I stumbled across the console.log() in debugging, with the explanation that it is good to print out variables to check what is going on in your code. In my opinion, this is the main way in programming, you always have to check that you get what you expect. This is of course combined with tests, but tests only show you which function is wrong, a print or console log shows what is going on.

In almost all my forum posts, which aren’t that many, I have told people to always print/console.log everything, since that’s how we have more control of the logic flow. My point is that, this little advice in debugging should almost be at the very start of the whole curriculum because you can print out text and other containers in html/CSS also, well if you use codepen then you will instantly see that something is wrong :stuck_out_tongue:

Thoughts from fellow campers? :slight_smile:

3

Yeah, personally I’d like to see the first JS lesson be the good ol’

console.log('Hello,world!')

With instructions for opening the console in Chrome, Firefox and Safari.

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