5 practical things that helped my online bootcamp experience
There’s a lot of mental preparation that goes into a UX bootcamp experience. For a lot of us, we’re navigating:
- Moving through a career change
- Going back to school for the first time in a long time
- Learning remotely for the first time
I was so ready to tackle those tough mental hurdles, but one thing that tripped me up at the start of my bootcamp was the tactical element of online learning. How can I set myself up for success?
Here are five things that I’ve picked up along the way:
A decent set of wired headphones with a mic can do wonders.
We’re all cooped up inside, and for those of us who are living with others, headphones can be super useful for controlling the noise. I first tried out my bluetooth headphones (Airpods) but noticed that myself and my classmates experienced connectivity issues while in our Zoom room. I immediately purchased a simple set of $10 wired headphones with a mic, which made a world of difference in my learning experience.
Experiment with note taking so you can understand how you learn best.
The ideal state is learning through diffusion, but let’s face it — you can’t remember everything unless you have some sort of super memory! For me, this was a pretty tricky feat. I’ve tried a few methods: OneNote, Google Docs, the Notes app… until I realized that I was starting to retain anything that I wrote down. Play around with different digital and written note taking methods to see what works best for you. Also, be mindful of the amount of paper you need… see point #5 below.
Invest in a comfy chair, second monitor, standalone keyboard, and mouse.
In a UX bootcamp, you’re going to have a LOT of windows open: Zoom, Slack, a browser with a billion tabs, and multiple programs (Sketch/Figma, Miro, a PDF of your lecture, etc.). You may also need to share your screen during a collaborative activity. It’s super difficult to manage all of these things on your single laptop screen. Do yourself a favor and get a second monitor along with a standalone keyboard and mouse. These tools will help your multitasking experience so much easier.
Decide your lunch the day before.
We had a set lunch hour from 12–1 each day. In theory, you would expect this to be rather straightforward, but I learned very quickly at how irregularly I ate lunch prior to the bootcamp. Maybe I’ll get hungry at 11AM or 1PM and eat when I’m hungry, but it’s a lot harder to do that with a set schedule. You don’t want to be cooking your meal while on video during lecture or studio! Now, you don’t need to create an elaborate meal plan and bulk cook every Sunday evening. Take it easy: just plan the day before and decide what you’ll have for lunch, and prepare what you need in the kitchen so you’re ready to go.
Have paper ready for sketching exercises, and think about how to make the most of the real estate on each sheet.
The UX design process requires lots of iteration, especially early in the process with low and mid fidelity wireframes. We do a lot of exercises during the bootcamp, but I slowly came to realize that I have a very limited amount of paper at my disposal. I had to think creatively about how to allocate space on each page resourcefully. I would have saved so much more paper that way!
I know that the experience is going to vary from person to person, but I think these tips will be super helpful for all!
Are you a recent bootcamp graduate? What have you been up to? Is there anything that I missed? I would love to keep the conversation going in the comments!
Thanks for stopping by 🤠. Feel free to reach out and connect! You can find me on LinkedIn or check out my work on my website.
