Over the past couple of weeks I’ve been looking over a number of books designed to teach X/HTML & CSS. It’s a bit overwhelming knowing where to begin with all the versions and types of web coding. I landed on a book that I really enjoyed: Head First HTML with CSS & XHTML. Of the books I looked at, this one was by far the most engaging book on the subject.
Most of the reasons why the book was so interesting are also principles of good design:
- It is highly visual. Good images are more memorable than just words and make it easier to learn and understand concepts.
- Explanatory words are placed right alongside illustrations, rather than referenced elsewhere. It was very easy, for example, to look through code samples that were annotated line by line.
- Concepts are presented in multiple ways to accommodate different learning styles.
- Appeals to the emotional desire to have fun while learning are incorporated, through humor, fun games and realistic exercises.
I highly recommend this book for anyone interested in understanding more about the topic. You won’t finish the book ready to go straight to Dreamweaver and whip up a complex web site, but you’ll definitely know enough to be able to understand what’s going on under the presentation layer hood for most web interfaces.
