Learn to Program: The Fundamentals
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Course Details
Cost
FREE
Upcoming Schedule
- On demand
Course Provider
Coursera online courses
Coursera's online classes are designed to help students achieve mastery over
course material. Some of the best professors in the world - like neurobiology
professor and author Peggy Mason from the University of Chicago, and computer
science professor and Folding@Home director Vijay Pande - will supplement your
knowledge through video lectures. They will also provide challenging
assessments, interactive exercises during each lesson, and the opportunity to
use a mobile app to keep up with yo...
Coursera's online classes are designed to help students achieve mastery over
course material. Some of the best professors in the world - like neurobiology
professor and author Peggy Mason from the University of Chicago, and computer
science professor and Folding@Home director Vijay Pande - will supplement your
knowledge through video lectures. They will also provide challenging
assessments, interactive exercises during each lesson, and the opportunity to
use a mobile app to keep up with your coursework. Coursera also partners with
the US State Department to create “learning hubs” around the world. Students
can get internet access, take courses, and participate in weekly in-person
study groups to make learning even more collaborative. Begin your journey into
the mysteries of the human brain by taking courses in neuroscience. Learn how
to navigate the data infrastructures that multinational corporations use when
you discover the world of data analysis. Follow one of Coursera’s “Skill
Tracks”. Or try any one of its more than 560 available courses to help you
achieve your academic and professional goals.
Provider Subject Specialization
Humanities
Sciences & Technology
Course Description
Behind every mouse click and touch-screen tap, there is a computer program that makes things happen. This course introduces the fundamental building blocks of programming and teaches you how to write fun and useful programs using the Python language.
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- 6 reviews
- 6 completed
6 years, 10 months ago
I signed up for several different introductory CS courses (LTP1 and ITPP on
Coursera, CS50x and 6.00x on EdX) and I have to say that this was the best
one. Demanding but not too much - about 4-4,5h/week, very thorough but not
boring (the disjointed teching, that somebody here has complained about, was
for me a major upside - I found out that 6-10 minutes lectures are easier to
stomach than those gargantuan 2h lectures on EdX [I can easily sit and listen
for such time in real life auditorium but in front of my computer I get all
twitchy and my attention floats away]). This course did not cover a huge range
of topic but when it touched one, it would not stop until this topic was
covered 100%. Also the professors were very active on the forum and woud
answer questions, provide clarifications and respond to feedback. There were
also a few downsides but, interestingly enough, most of them - technical:
problems with final exam grading (res...
I signed up for several different introductory CS courses (LTP1 and ITPP on
Coursera, CS50x and 6.00x on EdX) and I have to say that this was the best
one. Demanding but not too much - about 4-4,5h/week, very thorough but not
boring (the disjointed teching, that somebody here has complained about, was
for me a major upside - I found out that 6-10 minutes lectures are easier to
stomach than those gargantuan 2h lectures on EdX [I can easily sit and listen
for such time in real life auditorium but in front of my computer I get all
twitchy and my attention floats away]). This course did not cover a huge range
of topic but when it touched one, it would not stop until this topic was
covered 100%. Also the professors were very active on the forum and woud
answer questions, provide clarifications and respond to feedback. There were
also a few downsides but, interestingly enough, most of them - technical:
problems with final exam grading (resolving this mess sure took some time),
differing level of sound during some of the videos and a total, horrible mess
on the discussion forum. But that would be about it - I frankly cannot even
think of a bad thing to say about the teaching part. It was so great that I
just can't wait for the LTP2.
- 3 reviews
- 3 completed
4 years, 8 months ago
Student
10/10 starsCompleted
5 years, 2 months ago
Despite being my first MOOC I felt very comfortable. I have told many of my
friends about the course. The instructions were simple and clear. It helped
learn a new language which I'm using even now for a lot of projects related to
my college coursework.
Python rocks, and this course is the best way for someone to enter the world
of Python!
- 2 reviews
- 2 completed
5 years, 3 months ago
This is one of the few MOOC courses that I have completed, along with Learn
to Program, Crafting Quality Code, and Karl Ulrich's Design course. (Both
taken well over a year ago now). The material delivered at about the right
pace, though I did find completing the assignments on time a bit of a
challenge, but doable. This is a terrific intro to programming, and to Python.
- 1 review
- 0 completed
5 years, 3 months ago
I Very much enjoy this course. It's free, and so ensures that the natural
constraints that would otherwise lead to single mindedness for both teacher
and student is avoided completely. There is a true sense of freedom in being
able to take an online course, in something you're truly passionate about, as
opposed to the usual academia rubbish forcing every decision you make, from
classes to test taking to the time you get up in the morning; there is just
something magical about the whole MOOC experience. However, this is only true
insofar as the teachers of a course are competent enough. I find that both
Jennifer and Paul are excellent in teaching the subject content, and are
obviously passionate about what they teach, making others passionate in what
they are learning, and for that, I thank them. Keep it up guys, this is truly
a magnificent, educating, and empowering experience, in which you helped to
bring about to the online communi...
I Very much enjoy this course. It's free, and so ensures that the natural
constraints that would otherwise lead to single mindedness for both teacher
and student is avoided completely. There is a true sense of freedom in being
able to take an online course, in something you're truly passionate about, as
opposed to the usual academia rubbish forcing every decision you make, from
classes to test taking to the time you get up in the morning; there is just
something magical about the whole MOOC experience. However, this is only true
insofar as the teachers of a course are competent enough. I find that both
Jennifer and Paul are excellent in teaching the subject content, and are
obviously passionate about what they teach, making others passionate in what
they are learning, and for that, I thank them. Keep it up guys, this is truly
a magnificent, educating, and empowering experience, in which you helped to
bring about to the online community!
- 1 review
- 1 completed
5 years, 4 months ago
As a engineer student, I had a previous programming "experience" (in Pascal).
This course was very good, the explanations were very clear, the organization
of topics, good tools (http://pythontutor.com/), the questions/exercises were
well elaborated. They teach us to program with QUALITY. I recommend for
everyone, from novice to intermediate. The course is not easy, but is not hard
because all you need you will find there. I do not have any complains. It was
perfect.
- 9 reviews
- 8 completed
5 years, 4 months ago
The course is VERY easy, goes at a relly slow pace, and for these reasons gets
to teach just the very basics of Python. If you have even a minimun amount of
programming knowledge this course is probably too easy and too slow paced. A
lot of trolls in the forums make them almost useless, too bad
- 1 review
- 1 completed
5 years, 10 months ago
With no programming or math background, moderate intellectual capacity, and
very limited time for studying, I successfully completed this course and am
keen to use and build up the new skill in practice. I loved everything about
this course: not a word too much, no digressions, no confusion, immediate
hands-on experience. There are a few things that might differ from other
courses: the videos are cut in very short sequences with a lot of intermittent
quizzes. Some might find it disturbing, but I found it very helpful. There is
no fuss with late days or penalizations between the due date and the hard
deadline for your homework. A summary comes with every lecture: real notes "to
take home"! Both lecturers speak a very comprehensible English and they are
excellent presenters in general. "Learn to Program: The Fundamentals" was one
of the best courses in my education career, live lectures included!
- 1 review
- 0 completed
5 years, 9 months ago
I am working full time and did not have enough time to finish the course. I
recently revisited the course. This is an excellent course, and I am going to
finish it. I recommend it to everyone. I am just sorry I had to drop it in the
first place due to work. The instructors are excellent.
- 1 review
- 0 completed
5 years, 9 months ago
Hi! My name is Dmitry, I am taking the course at the moment. I have to admit,
that the course is of very high quality, which grants it 5 stars. Nothing to
be said. I would only suggest you to add an instruction video on How Python is
applied, for example, quantitative analysis, in which I am primarily
interested, other ways python is used, and give examples, so everyone taking
the course could see how it is used and how can he use it for other purposes,
not only for those why he is taking the course. Thank you for an outstanding
course!
- 8 reviews
- 8 completed
5 years, 10 months ago
This is a perfect course for people with absolutely no programming experience.
It teaches one language, Python, in a very slow-paced manner (one week for
for-loops, another for while-loops, and another for for-loops OVER INDICES),
but it manages to cover enough in seven weeks for its students to become
comfortable with the very basics of Python and be able to explore new things
on their own. In particular, taking this course first has helped me keep up
with the much faster-paced Introduction to Interactive Programming in Python
from Rice University on Coursera, and Introduction to Computer Science and
Programming with Python from MIT on EdX. Taking this course first has allowed
me several weeks to get comfortable with things like iteration and string
manipulation. The teaching is fairly decent, though the professor's voices can
lull you to sleep at times. The majority of videos are taken up by the IDLE
interpreter, with the professor...
This is a perfect course for people with absolutely no programming experience.
It teaches one language, Python, in a very slow-paced manner (one week for
for-loops, another for while-loops, and another for for-loops OVER INDICES),
but it manages to cover enough in seven weeks for its students to become
comfortable with the very basics of Python and be able to explore new things
on their own. In particular, taking this course first has helped me keep up
with the much faster-paced Introduction to Interactive Programming in Python
from Rice University on Coursera, and Introduction to Computer Science and
Programming with Python from MIT on EdX. Taking this course first has allowed
me several weeks to get comfortable with things like iteration and string
manipulation. The teaching is fairly decent, though the professor's voices can
lull you to sleep at times. The majority of videos are taken up by the IDLE
interpreter, with the professor/s typing out programs as they speak. The
professors make a lot of typos which they then correct in the same video,
which was good because everyone makes typos and it helped emphasize how small
things can lead to total program failure. The instructors also made extensive
use of the Python visualizer tool to emphasize the logic of how programs are
executed, which helped me understand recursion later on in a separate course.
The assessments were surprisingly challenging. The quizzes were pretty tricky
and featured many debugging problems (what's wrong with this code/which of
these programs will work?). Many people sweated for days on the three problem
sets/assignments, but the assignment writeups were written very well, allowing
sufficient guidance but not giving away the answers. Here's an example of an
assignment (a word search game): http://spark-
public.s3.amazonaws.com/programming1/a3/a3.html This course is recommended for
anyone who wants to learn the very basics of programming. But people with even
just a little bit of prior experience may find the pace way too slow.
Student
8/10 starsCompleted
5 years, 10 months ago
Frankly, the only online course I completed, cause of the simplicity in
approach, the learning material, videos, exercises, etc. Made it a point to
complete watching the videos, doing the exercises and the assignment the same
day.
- 1 review
- 1 completed
5 years, 10 months ago
When I started this course, i had never used Python, although I use C and C++.
The course is really great and it definitely does what it says.. it makes one
learn how to program. I would recommend this course to everyone who is
interested in learninf Python from the ground up!
- 1 review
- 1 completed
5 years, 10 months ago
I enrolled this course more to get an understanding of how to teach non-
programmers to program. I really felt that this course did a great job with
that. The pace and content were perfect for a new comer into the world of
programming. Thanks to Paul and Jen for such a great course.
- 1 review
- 1 completed
5 years, 10 months ago
I enjoyed the course a great deal. The instructors were engaging and the
course was reasonably fast-paced but perhaps not challenging enough and a
little on the short side. I loved the assignments, I did think the focus on
the python visualizer was tiresome, but as I have had some experience in
programming I may have been above that particular material.
- 1 review
- 1 completed
5 years, 10 months ago
My experience with this course was excellent; it's engaging and fun. Python
it's a good course for beginners and people that want to learn python. I have
taken a programming class 9 years ago with java, to me was a little difficult.
Now after this course I'm reading a introductory programming book with java
and I can understand it pretty well.
- 3 reviews
- 3 completed
5 years, 10 months ago
Came into the course knowing nothing about python programming, and I've come
out knowing so much more! This course is awesome. The bi-weekly assignments
are also very fun, challenging and teach you a lot. The quizzes are very
helpful too, really testing if you know your stuff from the lecture videos.
Overall, an awesome course!
- 33 reviews
- 27 completed
5 years, 10 months ago
Carefully explains concepts, not just the mechanics of programming, in "baby
steps". Uses a freely available software that is easy to set-up and use.
Student
10/10 starsCompleted
5 years, 10 months ago
I took this course to discover more about promgramming logic and syntaxe, with
no experience in this field prior to it. The course was really well
constructed, material is of high quality and there was a good progression in
the difficulty level as weeks passed by. I really recommend this MOOC to
anyone who would like to start getting into programming or review the basics,
even if you are not really looking forward to getting into Python - that was
my case too. My only regret is that I felt very last lectures were going a bit
fast on a few notions (when you start getting out of Python frame to call
external files), though that seemed as a key for further explorations in
programming. Exercises and assignements were really satisfying as you could
feel the progression of your learning, and opening on application fields
ideas. Thanks a lot Paul & Jen, really appreciated taking this course, and
looking forward for the next level! It was my...
I took this course to discover more about promgramming logic and syntaxe, with
no experience in this field prior to it. The course was really well
constructed, material is of high quality and there was a good progression in
the difficulty level as weeks passed by. I really recommend this MOOC to
anyone who would like to start getting into programming or review the basics,
even if you are not really looking forward to getting into Python - that was
my case too. My only regret is that I felt very last lectures were going a bit
fast on a few notions (when you start getting out of Python frame to call
external files), though that seemed as a key for further explorations in
programming. Exercises and assignements were really satisfying as you could
feel the progression of your learning, and opening on application fields
ideas. Thanks a lot Paul & Jen, really appreciated taking this course, and
looking forward for the next level! It was my first coursera course, I hope
all future ones will be as stimulating as this one.
- 1 review
- 1 completed
5 years, 10 months ago
The course is very easy if you have some programming experience (in other
languages) and moderate if you are a beginner. The lectures are top notch. The
only problem I had with the course is that you have to complete only 3
programming assignments during the entire course which isn't that much. Would
have liked to have at-least a programming assignment for each week. The
difficulty of the course is easy. You start from the very beginning and it is
less advanced than some of the other programming courses on Coursera (like
Interactive Programming on Python from Rice, or Video Game Developing using C#
and XNA) and you need to spend less time in this than in other courses. If you
don't have any programming experience, this course is definitely for you. If
you have some programming experience but you don't know Python, this course
will be valuable. If you have knowledge on Python then don't take this course
cause this is an introduction l...
The course is very easy if you have some programming experience (in other
languages) and moderate if you are a beginner. The lectures are top notch. The
only problem I had with the course is that you have to complete only 3
programming assignments during the entire course which isn't that much. Would
have liked to have at-least a programming assignment for each week. The
difficulty of the course is easy. You start from the very beginning and it is
less advanced than some of the other programming courses on Coursera (like
Interactive Programming on Python from Rice, or Video Game Developing using C#
and XNA) and you need to spend less time in this than in other courses. If you
don't have any programming experience, this course is definitely for you. If
you have some programming experience but you don't know Python, this course
will be valuable. If you have knowledge on Python then don't take this course
cause this is an introduction level course. After you finish this you will
know to write functions, if-else clauses, while and for clauses, to use lists
and dictionaries and to read and write from files.
Student
10/10 starsCompleted
5 years, 10 months ago
I have no experience in programming before taking this course. First, it was
very easy and clear, then, it became more difficult but you can find some help
in the Forum. It was a very usefull course for me. Now, I am able to make
little programs. I recommand this course for the beginner.
Student
8/10 starsCompleted
5 years, 10 months ago
I came in with some experience of Python which helped me with some of the more
difficult problems. I did enjoy the course and found the lectures and forums
very informative. I'd advise anyone trying this course to do a few of the
codeacademy lessons for Python before starting so you have a bit more
understanding of the concepts.
Student
10/10 starsCompleted
5 years, 10 months ago
I had no prior experience with programming of any sort, and I was able to
complete the course successfully despite also getting a late start. This was
my first Coursera course, and it has me hooked. I thought the short length of
the videos was great, they were all info with no fluff (which is great because
I am trying to get the class done while my toddler naps). The instructors
seemed to make use of many Coursera features that made the course very user-
friendly.
Student
10/10 starsCompleted
5 years, 10 months ago
This course was a great experience, and I'd highly recommend it to anyone
whose interest is piqued by the course description. The instruction was well
segmented, well structured, and well delivered, and it convinced me more than
any other MOOC I've seen that online, self-guided courses can teach and assess
complicated, procedural skills like programming. A particular highlight was
the quality of the course's assessments -- they were free of errors and
ambiguity, perfectly aligned with what was taught in the lectures, and always
just difficult enough to be both fair and challenging. I have some personal
experience in writing educational assessments, and I understand how difficult
-- but worthwhile! -- it is to strike that balance. As for my own story (for a
sense of perspective), I have a wide range of academic interests, and I'd been
interested in programming for a long time, but had never had any opportunity
to actually learn it. Th...
This course was a great experience, and I'd highly recommend it to anyone
whose interest is piqued by the course description. The instruction was well
segmented, well structured, and well delivered, and it convinced me more than
any other MOOC I've seen that online, self-guided courses can teach and assess
complicated, procedural skills like programming. A particular highlight was
the quality of the course's assessments -- they were free of errors and
ambiguity, perfectly aligned with what was taught in the lectures, and always
just difficult enough to be both fair and challenging. I have some personal
experience in writing educational assessments, and I understand how difficult
-- but worthwhile! -- it is to strike that balance. As for my own story (for a
sense of perspective), I have a wide range of academic interests, and I'd been
interested in programming for a long time, but had never had any opportunity
to actually learn it. This course took me from being a wannabe hobbyist
programmer to an actual hobbyist programmer, which is exactly what I was
looking to get out of it. If you're looking for the same, then sign up!
Student
10/10 starsCompleted
5 years, 10 months ago
I used to think that programming was a terribly difficult and unreachable
thing before taking this course. Now I feel it is not that terrible, but on
the contrary. I have grown increasingly fanatised with the subject along the
course. This is an easy-to-understand, well explained course. The teachers are
just made of awesome so utterly well they enlighten you with programming
knowledge. This has undoubtedly been the best Coursera course I have taken so
far, so I am eager to take the follow-up course.