ES6 freeCodeCamp course difficulties

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Hi,

I just started with JavaScript course on freeCodeCamp and I would like to report some problems I encountered. Now I am relatively new to programing (have basic knowledge on Java and Python), I have finished HTML/CSS challenges and passed Basic JavaScript section in JavaScript.

When I started with ES6 section first i encountered inline functions which are not explained, but which I understood eventually, then on lesson ES6: Write Higher Order Arrow Functions I encountered map() , filter() , and reduce() functions which were not explained and I have to admit I cheated on that one. I hope that later lessons will be better explained. Just wanted to share my problems with this section which could be better explained or put on the end of the section (i don’t know what is ahead).

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Let me tell you I had a lot of problems with that section too. What I can tell you is: continue as you can and try to check other resources, like reading “You Don’t Know JS” which is free and online in Github.

I tried studying by myself Python in a Udemy course and when I came back to that section I understood better. I suggest you keep studying and eventually you’ll understand, don’t give up!

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Thanks for the support.

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Have you checked out MDN’s documentation on these higher order functions? (The one I linked is on map(), but you can quite easily find the documentation for the rest by typing ‘mdn javascript [insert function name of your choice]’)

I go to MDN at least once every time I code in Javascript; very handy and comprehensive :smiley:
And don’t be intimidated by the documentation if you didn’t totally understand the description straight away; scroll down and you’ll see it’s usually very rich in examples.

MDN is by far the best documentation imho. Easy on the eyes and informative.

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Great, thank you very much for all your help

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Luckily I have some coding experience but had I only learned the previous javascript sections I would have felt completely lost. Higher order functions have not yet been explained. Callbacks have not yet been explained. It hasn’t even been stated you can actually use functions as arguments at this point in the curriculum. The structures used are quite complex, immediately invoked functions are not for beginners. Difficulty has been piled upon difficulty.

Nevertheless I think the exercises are quite interesting except for the last destructuring challenge passing an object as the parameter of a function. That exercise and its solution seems to me not to be about what was explained. I quite enjoyed the exercises.

It’s a really good start and can form the core of this section but it still requires a lot of work. I remember being an absolute beginner. I had been coding for months and I stll didn’t understand the ‘return’ keyword properly. I didn’t understand what it was for because I didn’t know how to get at the value that was returned. It’s not difficult, just set it equal to a variable but I still had to learn that and nobody explained it to me. Everybody has to pass that stage and the ES6 section does not address these beginners.

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I recently posted a similar experience. I have found that going through the other Javascript sections before ES6 was extremely helpful. If anyone working the course beginning to end comes across this, I’d recommend saving ES6 till (nearly) last.
-J

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