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📓 Curriculum Details: Intro to Programming

Lessons​

Lessons provide the content for the Epicodus curriculum and are designated with a book icon and day of the week for review. Lessons include text to be read and a cheat sheet that summarizes terminology, code and tips from the text. As Epicodus coursework gets more advanced, students are encouraged to be more independent in using external resources to find solutions for the coding they are undertaking.

In the Intro to Programming course, lesson content will be explored as part of work in class (although you are always welcome to review at home as well). In all level 2 and 3 courses, lessons will be assigned as homework so that class time consists entirely of coding practice.

Exercises​

Exercises provide coding activities for students to practice the tools and concepts learned in the lessons. Exercises are designated with a pencil icon. Pre-work and weekend exercises are completed at home and exercises listed during class days are completed in class. In-class exercises are composed of several sections:

Goals​

At the top of each exercise the goals for completing the exercise are outlined. This includes what skills and concepts the specific exercise is focused around, and what we hope you'll gain from completing it.

Warm Up​

The warm up section contains discussion questions to go over with your partner. (Or, when included in the pre-work, to ask yourself before moving on). These ensure you both have a basic understanding of the concepts the exercise will explore before you begin coding, and provide you an opportunity to review as necessary before jumping into the code. Sometimes warm ups will contain brief reading material to go over with your partner, or short exercises, too.

Code​

This is the outline of the project or activity you'll be coding. This section generally includes the requirements of the project, and any relevant instructions, tips, tricks, or ideas.

Further Exploration​

This section contains ideas to take your projects one step further if you and your partner happen to finish the basic requirements with time to spare. This usually includes adding additional features, exploring bonus concepts, or other fun challenges.

Feedback​

Every lesson and exercise has a blue Feedback tab at the bottom right-hand corner of the window. Here's what the tab looks like:

Image of learnhowtoprogram.com feedback tab.

If the tab doesn't show immediately, you may need to scroll down the page for it to pop up. You can click the tab to open up a menu that has tools to help you leave feedback, like highlighting a section of a lesson that needs updating. This is what the window will look like after you click on the Feedback tab:

Image of learnhowtoprogram.com feedback tool menu.

If there is a lesson that really helped grow your understanding or if there is a suggestion you may have for improvement, we value your insight and hope that you will share it with us. We encourage feedback on any issue that comes up — both large and small — whether that is a typo, a passage that is confusing, or an area you feel could use clarification or any other kind of improvement.

Click the blue "feedback" button in the lower right to open a menu with options on how to leave feedback directly on the page. Use your email when leaving feedback or provide no email if you prefer to be anonymous. Your submitted feedback goes immediately to Epicodus Staff and is reviewed regularly.