When a programmer says that they are ‘self-taught’ or that they “taught themselves to code”, what do they mean by it?
Did they sit down at a computer, with reference to no other materials, and press buttons and click things until working programs started to emerge?
It’s unlikely that they learned to program this way. More probable is that our “self-taught” programmer had some instruction. But what? Did they use tutorials or reference content? Was the material online, printed, or hand written? Did it include audio or visual components? Was it static or dynamic?
What feedback did they get? Did their teaching material encourage reflection, assessment, or other checkpoints? Did they have access to a mentor or community of peers, experts, or teachers? How did they interact with that community? Could they ask questions, and if so what did they do with the answers?
What was it that they taught themselves? Text-based processing routines in Commodore BASIC, or the Software Engineering Body of Knowledge?
What were the gaps in their learning? Do they recognise those gaps? Do they acknowledge the gaps? Do they see value in the knowledge that they skipped?
And finally, why do they describe themselves as ‘self-taught’? Is it a badge of honour, or of shame? Does it act as a signal for some other quality? Why is that quality desirable?
