Exercise 6: Memorizing C Syntax

After learning the operators, it's time to memorize the keywords and basic syntax structures you'll be using. Trust me when I tell you that the small amount of time spent memorizing these things will pay huge dividends later as you go through the book.

As I mentioned in Exercise 5, you don't have to stop reading the book while you memorize these things. You can and should do both. Use your flash cards as a warm up before coding that day. Take them out and drill them for 15-30 minutes, then sit down and do some more exercises in the book. As you go through the book, try to use the code you're typing as more of a way to practice what you're memorizing. One trick is to build a pile of flash cards containing operators and keywords that you don't immediately recognize while you're coding. After you're done for the day, practice those flash cards for another 15-30 minutes.

Keep this up and you'll learn C much faster and more solidly than you would if you just stumbled around typing code until you memorized it second hand.