Leudwinus, I agree with you; "learning by doing" is the only way to become a programmer. I wrote a blog post on "The Best Programming Language". It was about finding the best language for an individual; we have different problem sets to solve and different brains to solve them with. "The Best Language" for each of us is the one that inspires us to code more, so that we learn more.

There are really two questions that have to be dealt with when we approach a new language. You hit on the first one; "How do I learn?" I tend to read a chapter of a book, and they write very small toy programs. How do I build a hash? How do I change a value in it? Later on I look at how to merge two hashes or call them by reference. When I get going, I'll start a personal project to accomplish something that is important to me. That pushes me to learn more and to keep programming. The code will be pretty ugly and need a lot of work, but it is a learning tool.

My list helps with the second question, "What do I learn?" I often try to take on things I just cannot comprehend. Breaking down the basics into a list lets me focus on learning those basics, one at a time. I can then go back to the big problem better prepared.