Here you can find an overview of the Social Hackers Academy program. It gives insight in how our program is structured, organized, what you can expect from the modules that we teach and last but not least where we teach and where you can find support during the week. Our half year course is divided into modules that last 3 weeks with exception of the project module that lasts 6 weeks. Below you can find a short listing of the contents and deliverables/learning goals of the different modules. The headers of the different modules link to the actual repositories that are used by teachers to post assignments/reading materials etc. Be aware that some of the modules make use of more than one repository.

• Are you a new teacher? Take a look here for some practical tips on how to get started!
• Are you a new student? Take a look at our Student Manual to see how to prepare for your first class!

The curriculum consists of 8 modules, spread over 7 months. Each module has a duration of 3 weeks, with the exception of React (5 weeks) and Project (7 weeks).

In the following diagram you'll find the sequence of all the modules included:

If you follow the program you'll learn the following skills:

• Ability to build a basic modern full-stack web application (using NodeJS, MySQL and React)
• Get experience with working in teams using Agile principles
• Knowing how to learn and self-teach new programming concepts
• How to use third-party libraries/APIs
• Have a basic understanding of what it means to work on digital products

Welcome to the wonderful world of web development! In this module you will learn the basic building blocks of the web: HTML and CSS. HTML gives us the power to add text, images and videos to a page. CSS gives us the power to organize these parts and make it look nice.

The products of HTML and CSS comprise a two-thirds of what is called frontend (the final third is client-side JavaScript, which you will learn about in later modules). What is frontend? It's another word for the presentational part of a piece of software. In terms of web development we're talking about "what you see" when you go to any website.

Think of it like this: if a webpage were a person, the HTML would be the skeleton and CSS the skin and clothing!

You'll also be learning GIT, software that will allow you to save your folders and files in case they accidentally get deleted or end up corrupt. It can do much more and you'll learn all about that starting from week 2!

In the following table you can find the module material, week-by-week:

By the end of this module, students should have a familiarity with and basic understanding of the following:

• Be able to write syntactically correct HTML and CSS
• Understand what is meant by responsive web development
• Practice navigating your computer using the command line interface (CLI)
• Learn about GIT and its basic usage
• Become familiar with Trello and GitHub as a way to submit your homework
• Know your way around Visual Studio Code
• Feel comfortable working with your browser's inspector

In this module you'll make a start into wonderful world of programming. We will be using the programming language JavaScript to do so. You'll learn about the basic building blocks of programming: loops, functions, control flow and more. Consider these as the ABC's of programming, without them it's impossible to write working software!

By the end of this module, students should have a familiarity with and basic understanding of the following:

• Have an idea of what computer programming is
• Know the basic building blocks of JavaScript
• Correctly write and use variables, functions and loops
• Understand the control flow
• Think like a programmer

In JavaScript2 you'll learn all about how to use JavaScript within the browser. First, you'll learn about how HTML is structured within your browser: we call this the Document Object Model (DOM). Once you've gotten the hang of that we'll apply JavaScript to it, in order to manipulate the elements and make our pages more interactive. We call this DOM manipulation and it's one of the most interesting things about JavaScript!

In order to successfully complete this module you will need to master the following:

• Understand what the Document Object Model (DOM) is
• Use the basics of DOM Manipulation
• Differentiate between synchronous and asynchronous operations
• Gain awareness of the inner workings of JavaScript
• Learn to think based on principles, instead of libraries and frameworks

A big part of being a programmer means moving data from one place to another. It also means working with other people's software. In this module you'll be learning about one of the core things of what makes a web developer: working with APIs!

On top of that you'll also learn how to think differently about how you write your programs. Like in any field, once you've mastered a particular way of doing things you start thinking about how it could be done differently. In programming we call these paradigms and in this module you'll learn one such paradigm: Object-Oriented Programming!

In order to successfully complete this module you will need to master the following:

• Learn what an Application Programming Interface (API) is
• Catch up on the history of JavaScript
• Understand how to write more readable asynchronous JavaScript
• Connect with different public APIs
• Build a Single Page Application (SPA)
• Work with pre-existing code
• Learn about Object-Oriented Programming

Any software application consists of at least 2 parts: a frontend, which is what the user sees and interacts with, and a backend. This module will expose you to the wonderful world of backend development, where you learn all about where your data goes once you've pressed that submit button. You'll be writing web servers and learn how to send users the right feedback.

In this module you will get familiar with the world of backend development. By the end of it you have learned:

• What is meant by the term backend
• The client-server model
• What HTTP and REST mean
• How to create your own web servers with Node.js, using Express.js
• What a templating engine is.
• How to use the Node Package Manager (NPM).
• How to use Express.js to make a RESTful API
• How to build a small full-stack application

In this module you'll learn all about a fundamental part of any software application: how to (safely) store data, so that it can be used on-demand. You'll learn how to structure and group data so your apps know where to find and store the correct data.

In this module you will get familiar with the complexity of storing data. By the end of it you have learned:

• What the meaning is of a database entity
• How to work with Structured Query Language (SQL)
• Learn all about the relational model
• Recognize the basic setup of a database
• Know about MySQL as an example of a relational database system
• Learn about NoSQL databases, with an emphasis on MongoDB

In these 5 weeks we will go back to the frontend and learn how to make faster, more modern user interfaces. You'll become more familiar with a frontend technology called React.js, a JavaScript library written and maintained by Facebook.

It is mainly used to create dynamic user interfaces, changing the data a user sees depending on their input.

In this module you'll learn about how to think about webpages in a radically different way: instead of making seperate pages, you'll be making components of pages. Instead of hardcoded content, you'll make structures that can hold different data.

By the end of this module, students should have a familiarity with and basic understanding of the following:

• Understand the React way of thinking about user interfaces
• Know the importance and place of state and how to pass it down
• Be able to work with different lifecycle hooks
• Distinguish between class-based versus function-based components
• Recognize the utility of modularization
• Putting emphasis on writing reusable code (components)
• How to handle client-side routing

In the upcoming 7 weeks you'll be immersed into the web developer life. By the end of it you will have created a full-stack web application and published it to the internet.

Everything you have learned so far will be combined and put into practice. Added to that you'll learn some more cutting-edge technologies that will prepare you for a great start in a modern software company. We will start out with the basics and incrementally add more complexity. This way you'll learn how all the pieces of a RESTful API fit together, thereby gaining a deeper understanding of where the backend stops and frontend starts.

Along with practicing your programming skills you will also be working on your communication skills. This is just as important, because you need to be able to communicate your ideas and efforts in an easy-to-understand manner.

By the end of this module, students should have a familiarity with and basic understanding of the following:

Technical skills:

• How to build a complete full-stack application
• Understanding how each part of an application relates to each other
• What it means to work on a feature
• How to work with GIT in a team setting
• How to write readable code

Communication skills:

• How to communicate effectively with team members
• Keeping track of your project's progress
• Knowing if you understand what's asked of you
• How to communicate with non-developers about what you're doing
• Learning how to be solutions-oriented
• How to work in a Agile setting

The final stage is graduation! Afterwards you can officially call yourself a junior web developer.

Post-graduation we'll work on finding you an intership/job in any of the companies we have within our network.

Learning how to write software is a challenging endeavour. However, with the right material and structure it is very doable.

This curriculum is our effort to make your ambition possible. You are free to use it for your own benefit.

If there's anything inside that you might think could be better, don't hesitate to tell us and/or make pull request!

Good luck with your journey and happy coding!

This curriculum is developed by HackYourFuture, modifications, and changes can be found in this Fork. (edited)

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Our curriculum is subject to CC BY copyright. This means you can freely use our materials, but just make sure to give us credit for it:)