Now that I work in a tech company, I hear the word self-taught pretty often. Much like learning an instrument or natural language, programming can seem incredibly intricate and complex. How do you dissect something like a programming language and put the pieces back together?

What Is It About Being Self-taught?

What interests me about the autodidact is the idea of genius. It seems to me that for someone to master a complex topic without guidance or instruction requires a certain level of genius. However, this assumption can be dangerous, and it’s often inaccurate. Conflating the autodidact with the genius leads to the misconception that you must be a genius to teach yourself effectively, so … how much self-teaching is required before you’re self-taught?

Another mental hurdle I can’t bound when it comes to the self-taught designer, musician or programmer, etc. is how the Internet fits in. We are now a Google away from so much information that it’s hard to imagine anyone figuring out anything without YouTube or Instructables guiding him or her.

What Does Self-taught Really Mean?

When I was younger I had no idea what self-taught meant. I assumed self-taught equaled no guidance or materials at all. Once I was old enough to track down interviews, it turned out that many learned from books, friends, videos, and other resources. Now, of course it makes sense that people don’t typically learn in a vacuum, but I was a kid, so what did I know? .

Self-taught typically meant someone learning without a formal teacher or program, but access to teaching materials was fair game. The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines self-taught as, “having knowledge or skills acquired by one’s own efforts without formal instruction.” This seems pretty open-ended to me. It also seems less intimidating to approach a topic if someone can be self-taught and still use a ton of educational resources. Maybe self-educating isn’t so bad if I’m allowed to get a little help.

The Benefits of a Good Teacher

In my experience, good mentors and teachers put you on a fast track. A good mentor knows where the sticking points are and how to overcome them. A good teacher knows how to connect things in a meaningful way. You may find all the information yourself, but it will take you far longer. If your teacher has 25 years of experience, you get to build on that. You are no longer starting at zero. You have the advantage of learning from your teacher’s mistakes instead of having to painfully make them yourself.

A good teacher will also push you when you want to stop. It’s easy to become frustrated when the going gets tough. When you are the only person holding you accountable it can be a slog to keep on track. Sometimes a teacher or a program can make a world of difference when it comes to motivation.

The Benefits of Being Self-taught

I feel that there is a huge benefit in pushing yourself to learn something on your own and achieving that goal. Perseverance is a valuable skill, and you will need it if you want to achieve anything that really matters. Learning to teach yourself will aid you well when you have to learn something for which there is no teacher and lacking internal motivation. In programming this happens all the time—there’s a new framework out, you have to learn it for work, and there is no tutorial.

Some people don’t learn well in structured environments. The danger of reliance on teachers is that we can unfairly decide that someone is good or bad at something based on his or her ability to learn that thing in a single context or curricular structure. I have known many people who thought they ABSOLUTELY COULD NOT understand something until it was explained in a different way. I’ve had this experience. By teaching yourself, you inevitably come across a topic explained multiple ways.

By exploring ideas on your own you also find little helpful tidbits that might have been excluded from a formal program. Digging around for a piece of knowledge on your own helps you critically understand something beyond the way a teacher thinks you should comprehend that topic.

Where Does this Leave Us?

So, what does it mean to be self-taught? After toying with the question a bit, I feel like being self-taught is nebulous. We no longer live in a time where information is difficult to find. However, the Internet is still short on formal educational programs. We are somewhere between being self-guided and being instructed. In a way, I think this is a good place to be, it’s the best of both worlds.

In the end, I think it’s less important that someone be self-taught or formally educated. The truth is that curiosity is what matters. The desire to be self-taught is a good one, because it means that you are actively thinking and motivated to learn. I still hold people who are self-taught in high regard, because we often assign genius not to people who have an extraordinary ability to learn but to those who are incredibly tenacious in their desire to learn.

Nice write-up. When it comes to programming especially, I think most of us learn ourselves. It's impossible not to, with the way things change every day and new frameworks and platforms come up.

But a mentor is invaluable. Spending time pair-programming with people who have been programming for several years is always a very rewarding experience. One always picks up subtle things that can't be quickly learned by been self-taught. It may be as simple as an IDE shortcut or a terminal command or a unique way of approaching a problem.

self taught when it comes to programming is rarely true. a lot of us learn by ourselves from others by reading books, blogs, articles, code snippets, etc. so are we really self taught? at the end of the day, it really doesn't matter. only the level of competence and ability to do the job matters.

I enjoy learning on my own... Its gonna expose you to alotta things.

Very nice piece!
I'm also very happy plying that high way of being self taught.

TOmmyJidex:
I enjoy learning on my own... Its gonna expose you to alotta things.

Not really

Its a long walk, but its worth it.

With all the available resources online, I don't know if a programmer can call himself self taught

The subject of being self-taught is an interesting topic for psychologists and philosophers. In the actual literal sense nobody is self taught, the reigning concept of tabula rasa means no one is born with knowledge nor gains knowledge without a surrounding reference.
Nowadays, the meaning is rather abstract and it often signifies not learning from a human instructor. If that is the case, then it is possible to be self-taught (to an extent). Mathematics is an aspect where people can be self-taught. For particularly brilliant kids, they figure out abstract concepts about the world, formulating their own ideas of how they see space and time. Of course, realisations build up to form other realisations causing the person's knowledge library to grow. However, when it comes to programming, once you have read or watched a tutorial about your fave language then you are not really self-taught.

Sorry to burst your bubble.

Stconvict:
The subject of being self-taught is an interesting topic for psychologists and philosophers. In the actual literal sense nobody is self taught, the reigning concept of tabula rasa means no one is born with knowledge nor gains knowledge without a surrounding reference.
Nowadays, the meaning is rather abstract and it often signifies not learning from a human instructor. If that is the case, then it is possible to be self-taught (to an extent). Mathematics is an aspect where people can be self-taught. For particularly brilliant kids, they figure out abstract concepts about the world, formulating their own ideas of how they see space and time. Of course, realisations build up to form other realisations causing the person's knowledge library to grow. However, when it comes to programming, once you have read or watched a tutorial about your fave language then you are not really self-taught.

Sorry to burst your bubble.

Hmmm... But a lot of people still find it difficult to learn programming online now?

Didn't read your write up line to line but must agree with you on this one

TOmmyJidex:


Hmmm... But a lot of people still find it difficult to learn programming online now?

It is truly hard to learn online owing to the countless number of contradicting and inconsistent materials scattered around the web. For example, learning C++ was very hard for me. I spent three years without understanding pointers. I kept iterating back and forth because I dropped it several times and had to start from the basics whenever I decided to pick it up again. There was one particular intimidating text I found online. It has 1000+ pages (C++ Primer, 3ed by Barbara Moo et al.). How the heck am I supposed to finish that in the next 5 years?
I had to find something less terse and learncpp was the answer. Finished C++ in 3 months; covered Java afterwards in 2; Javascript in 3 days; Python and C in 2 days.
I learned all of these without a physical tutor but I still attribute it to the knowledge of others contained within those books I read and those tutorials I watched.
Man is not an island to himself. You need knowledge (from others) to gain knowledge.

Something I noticed is you don't need to finish a whole text book. Like how many do you want to understand. What I do is learn the basics and start creating apps. Using what I've learnt

Stconvict:

It is truly hard to learn online owing to the countless number of contradicting and inconsistent materials scattered around the web. For example, learning C++ was very hard for me. I spent three years without understanding pointers. I kept iterating back and forth because I dropped it several times and had to start from the basics whenever I decided to pick it up again. There was one particular intimidating text I found online. It has 1000+ pages (C++ Primer, 3ed by Barbara Moo et al.). How the heck am I supposed to finish that in the next 5 years?
I had to find something less terse and learncpp was the answer. Finished C++ in 3 months; covered Java afterwards in 2; Javascript in 3 days; Python and C in 2 days.
I learned all of these without a physical tutor but I still attribute it to the knowledge of others contained within those books I read and those tutorials I watched.
Man is not an island to himself. You need knowledge (from others) to gain knowledge.

FincoApps:
Something I noticed is you don't need to finish a whole text book. Like how many do you want to understand. What I do is learn the basics and start creating apps. Using what I've learnt

.... Until a bug shows up and folks at stackoverflow start prescribing pills that need advanced knowledge of the language to swallow or they simply boo you back to study. It is better to have a sound grasp of the language and implement as you go. You can't just learn the functional part of C++ and start programming a full software! Maybe you can do that with other languages (Python, Javascript). Trust me, you don't want to try that with C or C++, especially when it comes to pointers.

I agree with you, but I'm talking from experience. I believe you read about it when you need it. Just like an api documentation. You read about the class you need when you need it and not just read all at once

Stconvict:

.... Until a bug shows up and folks at stackoverflow start prescribing pills that need advanced knowledge of the language to swallow or they simply boo you back to study. It is better to have a sound grasp of the language and implement as you go. You can't just learn the functional part of C++ and start programming a full software! Maybe you can do that with other languages (Python, Javascript). Trust me, you don't want to try that with C or C++, especially when it comes to pointers.

FincoApps:
I agree with you, but I'm talking from experience. I believe you read about it when you need it. Just like an api documentation. You read about the class you need when you need it and not just read all at once

Always on point