Learner Reviews & Feedback for Using Databases with Python by University of Michigan

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勉强吧

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The first 3 parts of this specialisation are a great way to get into Python. Everything is useful and explained pretty simply. My only two criticisms would be that it doesn't challenge you nearly as much as other courses such as CS50. The projects are relatively simple in comparison. The second is that there is little time watching the instructor write actual code which I feel would be pretty useful.

Using Databases with Python is the installment I was most looking forward to. It didn't really deliver though. We rarely wrote our own code unless following along in the worked examples. The projects involved editing 2 or 3 lines in pre-made code which, if I'm going to be honest, felt like cheating ourselves. Then week 5 was almost non-existent. It felt incomplete and the final project felt like one of those week 1 projects that are there to ensure that Python and everything are running on your system correctly. This one didn't translate well to an online course.

This class reached a bit further than I understood. A few of the applications were distributed and the assumption is that you would be able to edit them to complete the requirements of the assignment. it was a bit confusing to understand what I had to do....edit or write something different. I understand most of the topics, but the assignments were hard to grasp what was needed. The teacher did a good job explaining content and shows patience in the videos. I think the requirements are difficult to pull off in an online environment using free tools. I would have liked to use sql server and connect to a legit API using standard connection methods, but I am not sure that is realistic in this type of course. Overall, I would take it again. I learned quite a bit.

I enjoyed learning about databases and the introduction to SQL. The lessons are great and the instructor is well spoken as always.

That said, I found this course to be less consistent in it's difficulty than previous courses in this specialization. One assignment completely through me off, not because of the difficulty to complete the required actions, but because the description of how it would be assessed was unnecessarily ambiguous. The other assignments were too easy as almost all of the code was already written, sometimes with 0 changes being needed to make it run properly. Personally, I would have appreciated more exercises to better understand the nuances of the code and go get more practice but I'll still play around with it in my own time.

I loved most of it, lots of good information and everything to hand that's needed to learn python and databases. Really well taught - except for the final assignment. The zip file is outdated and that cost me an entire day. I would recommend not depending on the forums to fix the problems in an assignment but rather update the assignment. It was very buggy and I think didn't make the point it was intended to make. I learned some things but the cost in time was above what I wanted to pay - I have deadlines in real life and can't afford to get hung up like that to learn something that should be taught explicitly in the course. So thanks, yes, much thanks for the course, but please fix that assignment.

I felt like this course of the specialization wasn't as organized. First of all the object oriented class had no practical assignment, and while others did, they weren't contributing for the learning. I passed all the assignments but don't think I've mastered material here as much as in the previous courses of the specialization.

It seems to me that material could be broken up into two courses, and because it's squeezed in one, the instructors have to provide 99% of the assignment and finishing the rest 1% is not helping in learning. Would be much better to be required to do more work in the assignments (possibly step by step and by splitting the course).

An engaging teacher, but I did not learn as much from this course as the early ones in the specialization. The concepts being taught were relatively straightforward (e.g. relational databases) but the assignments required the use of unnecessarily complex code and datasets. The final assignment involved very complex code but didn't require you to understand it (rather, to update the data, run the existing code and take screenshots) - I felt that this was rushed, and that insufficient effort had been spent trying to create a useful learning experience for the student. I have decided not to go to the "capstone" project after completing this course.

I felt that weeks 1-4 went at a reasonable pace, but the week 5 material was rushed. Those programs were written by the instructor and presented quickly as examples, but some of the content in the programs was not already known or presently explained, like the "buffer" built-in function (found in Chapter 3 of Dr. Chuck's book but not covered in the course) and the "pass" keyword, which I had to find in the Python reference manual for an explanation. The week 5 programs were quite advanced and I would have liked more time spent on explaining them and perhaps a related programming assignment or two to help us learn the material.

3/5, great professor lectures and good textbook, but the class is structured in such a way as to rush us through every new concept without lingering to practice or revisit material, and the assignments seemed to use a lot of code that we weren't supposed to learn or understand -- just use for the sake of completing assignments, which I thought wasn't a great contribution to our learning. This class has a fun professor and decent reading material but it may take studying elsewhere to complement your grasp of concepts when completing the class's assignments.

A little too much on the easy side. I know learning every detail in code is not necessary - understanding broad applications is more important because it gives you vision of a goal and an understanding how you may get there. Details can be researched. There are ways and its not necessary to reinvent wheels. But I still feel like tweaking preloaded code is not rigorous enough to actually learn what we are doing. This class was much easier than the previous 3 courses in the cert.

While Dr. Chuck is still a great instructor, I think that this course lost some of its pedagogical value compared to Courses 1, 2 and 3 from this specialization. By this I mean that it doesn't teach students how to design algorithms, but instead, it offers an already-made algorithm which serves as a debugging exercise more than anything else. I wish to see a more challenging course in the future.

The course started off with an excellent introduction to Object Oriented Programming. However, the explanations on databases and SQL were very hurried, and the python programs were both very complicated and not adequately explained. I'm also not sure whether there was a point to providing a very easy peer-reviewed assignment and having teaching assistants also grade it.

This course is too difficult for those who have learned Python from scratch like me. There are more and more codes that I do not fully understand throughout the course. When I tried to finish my assignments, I felt like I was just revising the codes on the web without understanding them. However, as in the previous courses, Dr. Chuck is good at explaining the material.

In previous courses, the student was challenged to apply the learned concepts and do research and reading from the PY4E textbook. In this course, the textbook content covered material more advanced and useful than the online exercises. I feel like the course was too quick and cursory for me to have even a fundamental understanding of sql syntax for my own projects.

I feel that this portion of this course did move a little too quickly in terms of introducing new SQL concepts. The first couple Python program demos has my head completely spinning, and I think this could be largely avoided by having a couple more slides piecing together the logic of the programs. Other than that, another great course!

TA was EXTREMELY rude when asked a question about command line vs IDE. Refused to back down on the point, even though it was pointed out that the class allowed for it as per a reading in an earlier course in the specialization. This treatment was inappropriate and frankly disrespectful, and it soured the entire course experience.

I'd give this course 5 stars but explanations were quite vague, I'd like to learn more how to code than just from pre-written codes. But in general, Dr Chuck is a great teacher and I like his teaching skills and there are many things what can be improved. Also more exercises would be useful, especially from 3rd and 4th course.

This was the only course in the whole specialisation that went too quick for me. I thought the assignments were way harder than the content in the lectures. It took me quite long te figure things out, and had to use help of friends. I always felt like i missed some part of the lectures with additional explanation

it has been a good experience but in the last assignment the instructor said it copied from other student ,and i explained what just happened..

i know you have honor code (trust) but not always you right sometime things just happen whether unintentionally.

One request, Review my last assignment and reset it.

The lecturer is honestly a bit slow in his coverage of content and his scribbling is untidy. He also seems to want to intentionally make SQL look like its very simple and avoids giving interesting facts which he thinks may complicate the content but would be good to know anyway.