Most of what happens in a programming course evaporates as it happens. Programs get fixed and the broken versions vanish, taking the best evidence of your learning with them. Your journal is the part that stays: the running record where every crash, pasted traceback, and slow breakthrough turns into something you can look back through and actually see changing.
The hub is Code Journal. The pages below support it, roughly in the order you will need them:
| Page | When you need it |
|---|---|
| Your First Entry | Week one, facing a blank page |
| What a Strong Entry Looks Like | Once the habit exists |
| Journal Checklist | Before each unit’s collection |
| Showing Growth | Mid-course, when old entries become evidence |
| Final Reflection | The last week, reading the whole record |
Written forwards, read backwards
Entries take ten minutes and feel small while you write them. The value arrives months later, when Showing Growth calls week-one you as a witness — and that only works if week-one you wrote honestly.