Tier 1 · Gated foundation
Foundations of Programming with Python
A ten-week intensive that builds deep fluency in the Python language itself — the universal foundation every WIATech diploma is built on.
- Duration
- 10 weeks
- Tier
- Tier 1 · Foundations
- Certificate
- WIATech Certificate in Foundations of Programming with Python
Python is the universal foundation language of every WIATech diploma. FND 60 is a course on becoming fluent in the Python language itself: reading it, writing it, reasoning about it, and using it idiomatically. By the end, a graduate can read a 200-line module and predict what it does, write a clean 300–500 line program that solves a real problem, and hold a coherent conversation about why their code looks the way it does. It is the heaviest application foundation in the catalogue — the one nobody skips.
§ What you'll be able to do
- Read 200-line Python modules written by others and predict what they do
- Write 300–500 line programs with multi-file organisation, functions, classes and idiomatic style
- Choose the right data structure for a problem — list, dict, tuple, or set
- Handle errors as a discipline — fail loudly, design small custom exception hierarchies
- Write Python that reads like Python — comprehensions, with-statements, idiom
- Reason about objects — choose OOP vs functional decomposition deliberately
- Hold a coherent conversation about their own code and defend their design choices
§ What you'll cover
Programming, the Computer, and the First Python
Connects computing fundamentals to programming as an activity and introduces Python as the working language.
Variables, Types, and the Shape of Data
The bottom layer of Python literacy — built-in types, how variables refer to values, and value versus reference.
Control Flow — Decisions and Repetition
Conditionals and loops, the two structures every program uses to respond to data.
Functions and the Discipline of Abstraction
The leap from sequences of statements to compositions of functions, thinking like an engineer.
Collections — Lists, Dicts, Tuples, Sets
Python's data structures at working depth, and knowing which collection to reach for.
Files, Strings, and the World Beyond the Program
Reading and writing files, processing CSV and JSON, and manipulating strings for real data work.
Object Orientation — Classes and Objects
Programs as collections of things with state and behaviour — OOP at foundation depth.
Errors, Idioms, and Pythonic Code
Handling errors as a discipline and writing code that reads like Python rather than another language.
Putting It Together — The Integration Module
Wiring every piece into mature practice and preparing the capstone.
Capstone
The Working Python Project
A complete multi-file Python project (300–500 lines) built, defended and reflected on — with a code-reading explainer, a meaningful Git history, and an oral defence.
§ Tools you'll use
- Python 3.12+
- VS Code with the Python extension
- The integrated terminal
- Git
- The Python standard library
- requests