Ask HN: Found a way to teach Web Development to dummies. Should I write a book?

#1

Post by DonbunEf7 » Sun, Oct 14, 2018, 3:35 PM UTC

So my friend, who is the opposite of "techie" asked me to teach him Web Programming and so I did. He's able to code a decent static website by himself (didn't teach him Javascript or any other server side language) after about 2 weeks of daily lessons. When I was thinking of ways to teach him I thought of spaced repetition, which I recall is used for behaviors and language learning as well.

He and other friends told me to write a book using the same method, but I'm skeptical that people would be interested. So, before hiring an editor and trying to write it down, do you think it's worth to write a book with "my method" or if there are already books like these on the market?

Re: Ask HN: Found a way to teach Web Development to dummies. Should I write a book?

#2

Post by Eridrus » Sun, Oct 14, 2018, 3:44 PM UTC

One consideration, though not the only one, is that writing a technical book is never a good financial proposition.

If it's not a good financial proposition already, why write a book at all, vs making a website or a series of blog posts? The answer is usually prestige.

So, in general, I would say don't write a book unless you are doing it for your resume, otherwise there are better formats for technical content.

For your specifics, I wonder if the real benefit was you helping him through the material, rather than the method you used. We continue to have teachers despite there being tonnes of books on most topics people want to learn.

Re: Ask HN: Found a way to teach Web Development to dummies. Should I write a book?

#3

Post by dangerface » Mon, Oct 15, 2018, 1:17 PM UTC

Thats a cool way to teach but there are lots of free books and code camps that have a similar "Learn x in y days!" I don't know how you can compete with that.

The quality of these free resources are also really high and tend to be focused on noobs, thats a lot of really tough competition.

Re: Ask HN: Found a way to teach Web Development to dummies. Should I write a book?

#4

Post by stephen82 » Mon, Oct 15, 2018, 6:17 PM UTC

I would say "Go for it!"; you have nothing to lose, only to gain, like experience writing a book and acquiring extra knowledge by what people want to be taught.

Can we get a draft so we can help with the content so it can be as helpful and accurate as possible?

Good luck mate!

Re: Ask HN: Found a way to teach Web Development to dummies. Should I write a book?

#5

Post by timdavila » Mon, Oct 15, 2018, 7:38 PM UTC

That's a great skill and it's very cool that you want to give back, but you didn't teach your friend by giving him a stack of articles you wrote, right?

Why not consider becoming a tutor or teacher of some sort?

Re: Ask HN: Found a way to teach Web Development to dummies. Should I write a book?

#6

Post by matt_the_bass » Mon, Oct 15, 2018, 10:44 PM UTC

Eridrus wrote: post #2

One consideration, though not the only one, is that writing a technical book is never a good financial proposition. If it's not a good financial proposition already, why write a book at all, vs making a website or a series of blog posts? The answer is usually prestige. So, in general, I would say don't write a book unless you are doing it for your resume, otherwise there are better formats for technical content. For…

This is a great comment: “We continue to have teachers despite there being tonnes of books on most topics people want to learn.”