Teaching myself web development while still in school
How I learned to code in high school, turned it into client work after matric, and the habits that keep me learning.
Starting in school
I started teaching myself web development while I was still a learner at Hudson Ntsanwisi Senior Secondary School. There was no course and no plan. I learned HTML, CSS and JavaScript from free resources and by building small pages, breaking them and working out why.
Building things outside of school was a good way to learn. Every project raised a new question, and answering it taught me something I hadn't known I needed.
From practice to client work
I finished matric in 2025 with a Bachelor Pass, and that year I started taking on client work, trading as AZHYRE. The first projects were standalone websites. Then came Shopify stores, which taught me that a website for a business is about more than the code: products, settings, policies and maintenance all matter.
Since then I've built websites and Shopify stores for clients and for my own brands, and moved into web applications with React, Node.js and Supabase. My biggest project so far is CurShip, a shipping app for South African Shopify stores.
Habits that keep me learning
- Build real things. Tutorials help, but I learn most when something has to work for a real person.
- Document why, not just what. I write down why something exists, so I don't have to guess later.
- Use tools as collaborators. AI assistants, editors and frameworks change. I try to understand the work well enough that I'm not dependent on any single one.
Forge, my workspace
Those habits became Forge, my personal development workspace. It includes a small Python command-line tool that creates and lists projects and checks my developer tools. It's early, but it's where I keep my templates, notes and automation as I keep learning.
"Everything has a purpose. If it doesn't add value, it doesn't belong."
If you're teaching yourself to code while still in school: keep building. It adds up.
