Summary
In this video I walk my students through the workflow for submitting their Jupyter notebooks to Gradescope and then cover the essential Python syntax they need to start coding. I begin by showing how to download the .ipynb file from Colab, upload it to the correct Gradescope assignment, and run the first submission, noting that the initial grading run can take about five minutes while later submissions are instantaneous. I remind them to use the otter grader for immediate feedback, to run cells in order, and to contact the TAs for any Gradescope access problems rather than emailing me directly.
Next I introduce the basics of Python programming: the print function (with parentheses and quoted strings), comments using the # symbol, and variable assignment with a single equals sign. I emphasize snake_case naming conventions, avoiding reserved words and special characters, and I demonstrate how to inspect a variable’s type with the type() function. I show how f‑strings (e.g., f"{name}") provide flexible string formatting and review the three core data types—strings, integers, and floats.
I then briefly present type hints (e.g., age: int = 18) to illustrate optional static typing, though I stress they are not required. I move on to the input() function, explaining that it pauses execution and always returns a string. I demonstrate converting that string to int or float for arithmetic, highlight the difference between string concatenation ("5" + "5" = "55") and numeric addition (5 + 5 = 10), and point out typical floating‑point precision quirks.
Finally, I announce an upcoming practice assignment that will ask students to read an age value via input(), cast it appropriately, perform simple calculations, and output the results using f‑strings. The key actions for students are: (1) download and upload notebooks as described, (2) run cells sequentially and use the otter grader, (3) apply the printing, commenting, variable naming, and type‑checking techniques shown, (4) practice using input() with explicit type casting, and (5) complete the practice task to reinforce these concepts. Successful completion will ensure they are ready for future graded assignments that rely on these foundational skills.