I have decided to tackle the AWS Associate Level Certifications. I plan to do them in this order: Solutions Architect, Developer, and SysOps. Within the next few years, I would love to transition to working as a Cloud/Solutions Architect and/or DevOps Engineer, and certification would greatly help with the switch. At my current position, there's not much opportunity to have hands-on experience utilizing AWS services to create infrastructure in which to deploy applications. I have thus decided to learn it on my own through the Project-Based Learning series.
I find that I retain knowledge better through reading than via videos as one requires more focus, therefore my study will be textbook based. I will generally follow this study plan for each certification:
Read the study guide provided by Wiley for the certifications, such as AWS
Certified Solutions Architect Study Guide Associate (SAA-C03) Exam Fourth Edition. I plan to read 1-2 chapters a day depending on how meaty the content proves to be.
Do the practice tests at the end of the chapter.
Before reading the next chapter, redo the practice tests for all the prior chapters. Hopefully, this helps with some memory retention and faster recall of previous knowledge.
After completing the book and feeling confident about the practice tests I have taken, I will schedule the certification test about a week out. This will give me ample time to review and do some full practice exams to simulate the certification exam. I estimate that preparing for each certification will take me 1 - 1.5 months, so I figure, conservatively and with no retests, to complete all the certs by end of July? Fingers crossed.
This series won't be too long I believe, as there are only 3 certifications I have planned for this year. I only plan on writing a post once I pass each one and linking to the certification. Any change in pace might also warrant a small post to reset my resolve, but I plan to adhere to the timeline above.