Posts: 2,859
Threads: 143
Likes Received: 1,700 in 1,000 posts
Likes Given: 825
Joined: Jun 2017
(01-20-2019, 12:11 PM)jonesy20 Wrote: I've been coding on and off for 20 years. Not expert level but pretty decent at C#, C and Python and I'm on section 8 of the Intro to Python course. The quizzes are very ambiguous. I think I got a 65% on one of them and so many of the questions I could justify multiple answers to. The material and coding examples are trivial for me but the quizzes are just really poorly put together. I'm going to stick it out but probably would advice people to take a different course if you're a beginner.
Thanks for the advice!
WGU BSIT Complete January 2022
(77CU transferred in)(44/44CU )
RA(non WGU)(57cr)
JST/TESU Eval of NAVY Training(85/99cr)
The Institutes, TEEX, NFA(9cr): Ethics, Cyber 101/201/301, Safety
Sophia(60cr): 23 classes
Study.com(31cr): Eng105, Fin102, His108, LibSci101, Math104, Stat101, CS107, CS303, BUS107
CLEP(9cr): Intro Sociology 63 Intro Psych 61 US GOV 71
OD(12cr): Robotics, Cyber, Programming, Microecon
CSM(3cr)
Various IT/Cybersecurity Certifications from: CompTIA, Google, Microsoft, AWS, GIAC, LPI, IBM
CS Fund. MicroBachelor(3cr)
![[-]](https://www.degreeforum.net/mybb/images/collapse.png)
•
Posts: 13
Threads: 2
Likes Received: 4 in 2 posts
Likes Given: 13
Joined: Jan 2019
Just curious about the intro to programming final with python at OD... what was the final like?
Was it a lot of conceptual questions about topics from the videos or did it give lots of coding questions and you had to fill in the correct answers, or know the output of a given code? How did they test your understanding in the final?
•
Posts: 29
Threads: 3
Likes Received: 17 in 8 posts
Likes Given: 1
Joined: Dec 2017
I'm on Week 13 now. There are definitely good weeks and bad weeks in terms of the quality of the quiz. I'm sticking with it but this is not a very good course.
•
Posts: 29
Threads: 3
Likes Received: 17 in 8 posts
Likes Given: 1
Joined: Dec 2017
Week 17. I want to punch my monitor. Don't take this course. I'm so far in it's hard to quit but their business model appears to be to put together a trash quality course (they don't tell you what you got wrong on a quiz for example), somehow get ACE to approve it, and then spam you about signing up with one of their partner schools.
There really are questions where none of the answers make any sense, even after extensive googling. This is simple material made hard by poorly constructed quizzes.
•
Posts: 2,859
Threads: 143
Likes Received: 1,700 in 1,000 posts
Likes Given: 825
Joined: Jun 2017
(02-05-2019, 12:27 AM)jonesy20 Wrote: Week 17. I want to punch my monitor. Don't take this course. I'm so far in it's hard to quit but their business model appears to be to put together a trash quality course (they don't tell you what you got wrong on a quiz for example), somehow get ACE to approve it, and then spam you about signing up with one of their partner schools.
There really are questions where none of the answers make any sense, even after extensive googling. This is simple material made hard by poorly constructed quizzes.
The not knowing about quiz results is definitely annoying.
Have you done any of the other courses?
I found the robotics course to be very easy and the cyber security course to be quite doable (though there was one question I found that was outdated, it asked how many data centers Google had in the US, the "correct" answer was given in the lecture video but the video was a few years old and Google had since built more data centers).
I'm still on pause with the python course as I'm focusing on other things now, but it was definitely more challenging than the others.
WGU BSIT Complete January 2022
(77CU transferred in)(44/44CU )
RA(non WGU)(57cr)
JST/TESU Eval of NAVY Training(85/99cr)
The Institutes, TEEX, NFA(9cr): Ethics, Cyber 101/201/301, Safety
Sophia(60cr): 23 classes
Study.com(31cr): Eng105, Fin102, His108, LibSci101, Math104, Stat101, CS107, CS303, BUS107
CLEP(9cr): Intro Sociology 63 Intro Psych 61 US GOV 71
OD(12cr): Robotics, Cyber, Programming, Microecon
CSM(3cr)
Various IT/Cybersecurity Certifications from: CompTIA, Google, Microsoft, AWS, GIAC, LPI, IBM
CS Fund. MicroBachelor(3cr)
•
Posts: 2,421
Threads: 23
Likes Received: 1,199 in 778 posts
Likes Given: 227
Joined: Jul 2011
(02-05-2019, 12:27 AM)jonesy20 Wrote: Week 17. I want to punch my monitor. Don't take this course. I'm so far in it's hard to quit but their business model appears to be to put together a trash quality course (they don't tell you what you got wrong on a quiz for example), somehow get ACE to approve it, and then spam you about signing up with one of their partner schools.
There really are questions where none of the answers make any sense, even after extensive googling. This is simple material made hard by poorly constructed quizzes.
The lack of ability to review your quiz results to see what you got right and wrong was one of the main reasons I dropped OD from my personal list of approved course providers. How can you get better if you can't tell where you need improvement?
I also didn't like their format... I don't mind video lessons, and the ones I saw (in the Psychology course) were actually very interesting, but the lack of text transcripts/summaries and the requirement to watch the whole video to get credit for the lesson annoyed me. Sometimes I just want to be able to read the transcript and use the video when I need visuals.
Either way, I had planned to take 3-4 courses through them when they first opened, but after the first 5 lessons, I determined it wasn't for me. I quit and went back to Study.com where I completed the rest of the courses I needed.
Much of their material comes from traditional college lectures, some lessons come from the great courses (which are usually taught by college professors as well), and supplemental material comes from various internet sources, so the course material quality seems to be pretty solid overall, its the presentation, assessment mechanism, and quiz content that needs to be revisited. Testing you on material that isn't covered in the lesson is a sign of a disconnect between the content developers (the lecturers) and quiz developers (the onlinedegree staff).
Working on: Debating whether I want to pursue a doctoral program or maybe another master's degree in 2022-23
Complete:
MBA (IT Management), 2019, Western Governors University
BSBA (Computer Information Systems), 2019, Thomas Edison State University
ASNSM (Computer Science), 2019, Thomas Edison State University
ScholarMatch College & Career Coach
WGU Ambassador
Posts: 29
Threads: 3
Likes Received: 17 in 8 posts
Likes Given: 1
Joined: Dec 2017
I'm just going to PLA Intro to Programming and possibly Data Structures. I've had a couple of somewhat successful IT related startups and recently built this robot. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WNJRObG7_yA Thousands of lines of C# code, C++ Arduino, Python for motor control and accelerometers.
I think I should be able to use those, MOOCs, etc to PLA those two courses.
I'm working through Intro to OS at Study.com today. Much higher quality, worth spending the money.
•
Posts: 62
Threads: 4
Likes Received: 8 in 7 posts
Likes Given: 46
Joined: May 2018
Since people on this tread say that OD's Intro to Programming isn't that good, where should I take this class?
In Progress
UMPI BAS (Fall 2)
Completed
Pierpont BOG AAS Information Systems Emphasis (Summer 2024)
•
Posts: 2,421
Threads: 23
Likes Received: 1,199 in 778 posts
Likes Given: 227
Joined: Jul 2011
(02-05-2019, 07:06 PM)gamebradie Wrote: Since people on this tread say that OD's Intro to Programming isn't that good, where should I take this class?
If you need it for the BACS, then the OD course is still the best cheap online option. If you actually want to learn Python (and if you want a CS degree, I'd hope that you do), I'd suggest learning Python using one of the free online methods elsewhere, do some projects on your own, and then come back to take this course for the credit once you've already got a solid handle on it.
If it is like the SDC and SL courses, I suspect you can't actually learn Python well enough using the OD materials alone anyway. Taking the OD course, you'll just have to deal with the out of order course materials and the shaky connection between course content and quizzes that have been discussed here.
Working on: Debating whether I want to pursue a doctoral program or maybe another master's degree in 2022-23
Complete:
MBA (IT Management), 2019, Western Governors University
BSBA (Computer Information Systems), 2019, Thomas Edison State University
ASNSM (Computer Science), 2019, Thomas Edison State University
ScholarMatch College & Career Coach
WGU Ambassador
•
Posts: 29
Threads: 3
Likes Received: 17 in 8 posts
Likes Given: 1
Joined: Dec 2017
There are tons of MOOC courses on Python on Coursera and Edx. I would suggest doing one or two of those and then do PLA.
https://www.coursera.org/specializations/python
https://www.edx.org/course/computing-in-...gramming-2
You might only need to do the first course in each specialization. The trick is to make sure that everything covered in the MOOC course covers each of the learning objectives in the syllabus.
Maybe that would be an interesting project. To document what combination of MOOC courses would cover learning objectives for different courses. Might make for a good blueprint for PLA using MOOCs.
•
|
