Coursera offers, in cooperation with the University of Michigan, a free online course: Programming for Everybody (Getting Started with Python), that aims to teach everyone the basics of programming computers using Python.
About The Programming For Everybody Course
The course covers the basics of how one constructs a program from a series of simple instructions in Python. The course has no pre-requisites and avoids all but the simplest mathematics.
Anyone with moderate computer experience should be able to master the materials in this course. This course will cover Chapters 1-5 of the textbook “Python for Everybody”. Once a student completes this course, they will be ready to take more advanced programming courses. This course covers Python 3.
- The course is designed for: Beginner level.
- Offered by: Coursera platform in cooperation with University of Michigan.
- Course duration: 19 hours.
- Price: Free of charge.
- Certificate upon Completion: Available with the paid version.
- Course language: English (Subtitles: Arabic, French, Portuguese (European), Chinese (Simplified), Italian, Vietnamese, Korean, German, Russian, Turkish, English, Spanish).
- Already enrolled: 2,271,502 students.
- Course Rating: 4.8/5.
What you will learn
- Install Python and write your first program
- Describe the basics of the Python programming language
- Use variables to store, retrieve and calculate information
- Utilize core programming tools such as functions and loops
Course Syllabus
What you will learn from this course
- Chapter One – Why we Program?
These are the course-wide materials as well as the first part of Chapter One where you explore what it means to write programs.
- Installing and Using Python
In this module you will set things up so you can write Python programs.
- Chapter One: Why We Program (continued)
In the first chapter you try to cover the “big picture” of programming so you get a “table of contents” of the rest of the book. Don’t worry if not everything makes perfect sense the first time you hear it. This chapter is quite broad and you would benefit from reading the chapter in the book in addition to watching the lectures to help it all sink in.
- Chapter Two: Variables and Expressions
In this chapter they cover how a program uses the computer’s memory to store, retrieve and calculate information.
- Chapter Three: Conditional Code
In this section you move from sequential code that simply runs one line of code after another to conditional code where some steps are skipped.
- Chapter Four: Functions
This is a relatively short chapter. you will learn about what functions are and how we can use them.
- Chapter Five: Loops and Iteration
Loops and iteration complete our four basic programming patterns. Loops are the way we tell Python to do something over and over. Loops are the way we build programs that stay with a problem until the problem is solved.
How to enroll in Programming for Everybody course for free
Check the course official website and click on “Enroll For Free”. A “7-day Free Trial” box will pop up to you. Here you have two options, you can either join the paid version of the course by clicking on “Start free trial”, or you can view all course lessons for free by clicking on “Audit this course”.
After clicking on “Audit this course”, you can choose “Full Course, No Certificate” and then click on “Continue” to start your course for free!
If you are unable to pay and want a certificate, you can apply to Coursera for Financial aid.
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