Ask HN: Online courses with video, text, quizzes or a mixture – which is best?
What type of instruction do you prefer when learning a tech-related course (e.g. a programming language)? Do you combine different teaching options?
Examples of different teaching approaches:
- Text and interactive exercises (e.g. 'educative', 'codecademy')
- Video (e.g. Udemy, Pluralsight, YouTube, LinkedIn Learning)
- Video and interactive activities (e.g. Scrimba)
- Books (printed or ebook)
For me, I have found video is massively varied. Although instructors may be familiar with a subject, not all are good at teaching. The best instructors understand their subject but also explain their subject clearly. Also, overly long videos can make watching video a chore. But there are always exceptions (e.g. Harvard online CS50?)
What is your experience when taking a tech course? What do you prefer and why (e.g. video, text, quizzes, interactive, books etc)? I do most of my learning away from the computer. I like videos like LinkedIn learning and YouTube and books.
On the job I just scan the web semi-frantically lol.
I’m usually learning on an intermediate level.