Looking back 2020
2020 was the special year for everyone. I have worked from home since February and have changed so many things, which are almost everything. In this year, I didn’t go to meetups and drinks even online. I just worked and spent with my family. Of course It’s not fun, but it’s a good opportunity to start new things. I tried two new things in this year.
Studying Computer Science in UoPeople
As I mentioned in the post (https://medium.com/@koba04/studying-at-uopeople-d9abdc9a009f), I have been studying Computer Science in UoPeople. This year, I have taken the following courses.
- English Composition 1 (ENGL 0101)
- Online Education Strategies (UNIV 1001)
- Programming Fundamentals (CS 1101)
- Programming 1 (CS 1102)
- [In Progress] Programming 2 (CS 1103)
The courses’ contents are not hard for me because I’m already familiar with those topics, but it takes a lot of time because I have to read resources and write many documents in English (about 1000words/week). Especially, peer reviews are time-consuming. My motivation for this is to study Computer Science systematically and not expand my career, which is like a hobby project for me. So I realized that keeping the motivation is hard. I have to use much of my free time for this, which means that I have to give up something like OSS contributions. UoPeople has five terms in a year, and the period of each term is two months and has two weeks of a break between each term, which means that I have to study most of the period.
https://www.uopeople.edu/become-student/academic-calendar/
I have to spend many times than what I expect before, so I’m considering how to reduce the time for UoPeople without dropping out. But I’m also looking forward to studying further courses because those courses treat more advanced topics than what I have studied.
Studying English with a personal trainer
I had taken lessons in online English conversations to study English for years. But I doubted that it might not be effective for me. To understand how I should study English, I have used a service to study English with a personal trainer. The period was three months, and I had to study English for two hours every day. I have learned some methods I have never tried before like dictations and shadowing. My English skill didn’t gain so much during the period, but I have learned how to study English, so I think I can improve my English skill in the future, so it was good for me even though the cost was expensive. BTW, it was very hard for me to study English while studying in UoPeople...
Lessons Learned
Micromanagement is bad. I’m using a task management app, Things, to put anything that I want to do, which includes studying English and reading an article, and so on. I have so many things I want to do, so the list for every day becomes a lot. Each task doesn’t need much time though. I did the tasks every day, but it means that I only did subtle tasks every day. As a result, I didn’t do anything that has a huge impact because I couldn’t spend much time for something that isn’t listed on the task list. For example, I no longer dig into React internals before, and I don’t understand the concept of the latest React internals like Lanes. I guess this could be a bad influence on my career. So I’m considering to reduce the time for my daily tasks.
2021
I have no specific plan for the year, but I want to focus on a specific thing rather than shallowly working on various things. I want to be a good web developer, so I’ll focus on something related to the web. In addition, I’m still enjoying programming with Rust, so I’d continue to study it.
Many companies have adopted WFH because of the pandemic. I guess many parts of the companies would resume working in their office after the pandemic like before, but I hope that many companies continue WFH permanently. I think it’s definitely important to meet coworkers in person, but it doesn’t have to do every day; once a month is enough for me. I’m looking forward to being able to work with engineers regardless of the living place.
