A beginner-friendly introduction to the core concepts every programmer works with
This course contains the use of artificial intelligence. Some videos use AI-generated voiceover. In addition, certain illustrations and short video fragments were created with AI generation tools.
What you’ll learn
- Communicate with AI coding assistants like a technical lead by using precise vocabulary (variables, loops, lists, functions, objects, dot notation)..
- Read, analyze, and understand any algorithm by breaking it down into its core building blocks (actions, decisions, loops)..
- Describe desired behavior of a program, spot hallucinations, request corrections, and understand the code returned..
- Reason fluently about program state by tracking how variables change over time through loops and conditional branches..
Course Content
- Introduction –> 1 lecture • 1min.
- Workflow –> 2 lectures • 7min.
- Variable –> 2 lectures • 6min.
- Loop –> 2 lectures • 5min.
- List –> 2 lectures • 6min.
- Data Type –> 2 lectures • 6min.
- Function –> 2 lectures • 4min.
- Object –> 2 lectures • 4min.

Requirements
This course contains the use of artificial intelligence. Some videos use AI-generated voiceover. In addition, certain illustrations and short video fragments were created with AI generation tools.
Hello!
My name is Rosti, and for the last 30 years, I have been doing one thing I truly love: explaining programming to people who think they “can’t learn it.”
I have taught 6-year-olds. I have taught university students, career changers, and retirees.
And I know for certain: the concepts you learn first are the ones that stick with you forever.
If you deeply understand a few key concepts from the very start, everything else becomes easier.
That is what this course is.
It focuses on understanding of the fundamentals:
- What is a workflow and how it represents a system changing from one state to another
- A system’s state is simply the collection of all its variable values at a given moment
- The two ways to control loops: counters and conditions
- Why lists are preferable to creating many separate variables
- Why a program needs to know a variable’s data type to store, interpret, and use it correctly
- What is a function, why naming a workflow enables reuse, and how functions allow developers to build on each other’s work
- What is an object, how it combines data and functions into a single unit, and how dot notation lets you access what an object knows and does