online courses are great but they have some limitations they have a fixed curriculum a set path that everyone follows but here's the thing learning is not one size fits all we all have different ways of understanding concepts and different speeds at which we grasp new ideas this is where AI shines it's like having a personal tutor available 24/7 a tutor that has access to unlimited pool of knowledge curious about a specific concept AI can dive deep into it want to explore for a tangential topic AI has got you covered with AI your curiosity becomes your
curriculum but there is more to it AI doesn't just provide information it adapts to your learning style it can explain the same concept in multiple ways until you get it it can generate practice problems tailored to your skill level it can even help you debug your code now you might be thinking doesn't it make learning too easy well AI doesn't have to spoon feed you information it can challenge you to think think to question to explore it's not about making the learning effortless it's about making it more efficient and effective consider this when you are
learning from an online course you are limited by the pace and the scope of the material if you don't understand something your only hope is to find a forum or a friend that can help you with AI you can get immediate clarification explore related Concepts or even challenge yourself with more advanced ideas if you're grasping things quickly AI also allows you to explore why behind the program in Concepts not just the how you can ask followup questions explore edge cases and understand the historical context of different programming paradigms this deeper understanding can make you a
better programmer before I give you the exact prompts that we will be using to learn programming let's talk about which AI tool to use the big three right now are chat GPT Gemini and Claude think of these as consultants each with their own strengths when I'm working on something foundational like making a study plan I often can consult all three to get a range of perspectives but if I had to pick a favorite right now it's clawed it gives me more detailed nuanced answers which is great for learning complex topics that said AI is evolving
rapidly what's best today might not be the best tomorrow so experiment with all of them and see which one works the best for you now that we have covered the why and the what let's get into the how we going to take a structured approach to learning coding with AI following the 8020 rule we will focus on the quote 20% of the concepts that will give us 80% of the results and then we will learn the Rest by building projects this approach is crucial because it gets you to a point where you can build the
real things quickly instead of spending months learning every Nuance of a language before writing your first program you will be creating actual projects within weeks this not only keeps you motivated it also helps you learn more effectively by applying Concepts in real world scenarios here is a prompt that you can use to create your study plan I want to learn x x can be python react angular or whatever you are learning for this example I'm going to replace it with python I Want To Learn Python please create a comprehensive study plan following the 020 rule
focusing on the code 20% of Concepts that will allow me to start building projects the plan should be structured week by week for y weeks with each week covering specific topics replace y with the number of weeks you can give to the study plan I'm going to use eight for this example after the 8 week core learning period Please suggest five projects of increasing difficulty from beginner to Advanced that will help me apply and expand my knowledge of python for each project provide a brief description and list the key Concepts it will help reinforce please
ensure that the plan is detailed enough for a beginner to follow but also challenges me to think and problem solve independently I will provide a link to all the prompts in the description this prompt will give you a solid road map to follow but remember a plan is only as good as its exec ution so let's talk about how to tackle each step of your study plan effectively the key here is going to be active recall it's not enough to passively read about the concepts you need to engage with them apply them and struggle with
them that's where the real Learning Happens Active Learning is a wellestablished scientific finding that says that actively retrieving information is far more effective for learning than passively reviewing it so here is a prompt that we can use to learn each concept from our study plan I'm learning Y in X using the example of python the statement would read something like this I'm learning conditional statements in Python please provide one a concise explanation of conditional statements including its purpose and when it's commonly used a common code example demonstrating conditional statements three common mistakes or misconceptions beginners
often have about conditional statements and how to avoid them two real world applications or scenarios where conditional statements are particularly useful three aggressively challenging exercises that will help me practice using conditional statements please don't provide Solutions only the problem statements after providing this information please ask me a thought-provoking question about conditional statements that would encourage me to think deeper about its applications or implications if you look a little closer at this prompt you start with understanding move on to the application and then to the problem solving this emulates the natural learning process the prompt structure
ures that you are not just passively consuming information but actively engaging with it through exercises the exercises force you to do active recall by applying what you have just learned the common mistakes help you avoid pitfalls and the thought-provoking question encourages deeper Reflection by asking for real world applications you are also Bridging the Gap between theory and practice this helps you understand why you are learning a particular concept and how it fits into the bigger picture of software development now let's move on to the exciting part which is building projects this is where you will
really cement your learning and start feeling like a real programmer remember the goal here is not to have ai build the projects for you we want to struggle a little bit because that's where the real learning happens we want AI to guide you not to do the work for you Project based learning is very effective because it forces you to apply your knowledge in a practical context you will encounter real world problems and learn how to solve them here is a prompt that you can use when starting each project I'm about to start working on
X which involves y replace x with the name of the project and Y with a brief description of the project my current skill level in Z is beginner intermediate or Advanced replace C with the programming language you are using and pick one of the skill levels please provide a high level overview of the main components or features this project should have a suggested project structure including main files or modules I'll need to create three key challenges I might face while building this project and general strategies to overcome them without specific code Solutions two stretch goals
I could aim for to make the project more complex once I have completed the basic functionality three important concept or skills from Z that this project will help me reinforce or learn C is again going to be the programming language of your choice please phrase your response in a way that guides my thinking without providing explicit Solutions I want to be challenged to figure out the implementation details on my own this prompt will give you a solid starting point without robbing you off the valuable learning experience of figuring things out on your own as you
progress through your projects try to rely on AI less and less use it as a fallback whenever you are really stuck not as the first result the high level overview helps you see the big picture before diving into the details understanding the overall architecture before diving into the details of the implementation is a very important skill in software development by asking for potential challenges and strategies to overcome them you are preparing yourself for the reality of programming things rarely go smoothly the first time and learning how to troubleshoot and problem solve is as important as
learning the programming itself the stretch goals have two purposes first they give you something to aim for after finishing the basic project keeping you motivated to continue learning second they help you understand how a simple project can be expanded and improved which is very common in real world software development as you work through these projects you'll likely find yourself coming back to the AI with more and more specific questions that's great it means that you are engaging deeply with the material and you are thinking critically about what you are building don't be afraid to ask
for clarification or for the AI to explain things to you in a different way if you're not understanding something always remember that AI is there to help your learning not to replace it the goal is to become a self-sufficient programmer who can solve problems independently not someone who relies on AI for every line of Code by the time you have completed your study plan and built your projects you would have mastered the art of working with AI a skill that is becoming increasingly valuable across all Fields you will learn that prompting is indeed an art
those quick W queries might get you somewhere but it's the detailed wellth thought out prompts that unlock ai's true potential the ability to effectively communicate with AI to ask the right questions in the right way will set you apart in the programming world and Beyond the skill is not just valuable for learning programming as AI becomes more and more integrated into different fields the ability to effectively use AI tools will become a crucial skill in many professions by learning to use AI for programming you are also preparing your ourself for a future where AI collaboration
will be omnipresent once you have learned programming you might also want to get a job as a software engineer for that you will need to master data structures and algorithms if you want to know the fastest way to learn data structures and algorithms watch this video my name is sahil and I'll see you in the next one
