For what it may be worth, my good padewan, you may rest assured that your professor really does know exactly what (s)he is doing.   Believe it or not, (if you persevere in this very-strange-feeling “swimming lesson”) you will emerge from this baptism, “enlightened.”

Do not hesitate to avail yourself of your instructor ... and bear in mind that (s)he (with deliberate purpose) expects and requires you to ... ask!

The most important matter ... and please, pay close attention to my words here ... is not whether you ask, but, exactly what it is that you eventually ask.

I apologize for sounding inscrutable here, and if you want to dismiss me as an absolute <!>hole ... please, go ahead.   I don’t mind.   The first computer program that I ever wrote, almost thirty years ago now:

1. Was eight lines long.
2. Took me six months to write.   (“Computer science” college degrees did not yet exist.   Heh.)
3. Had a bug in it.   (Some things never change...)

I am not mocking you.