CS1 in Python Peer Instruction Materials

Topics Coverage Summary: variables, types, assignment, order of operations, lists, dictionaries, functions, scope, conditional statements, logical expressions, while loops, for loops

There are two separate editions of PI materials for CS1 in Python. One was developed by Daniel Zingaro of University of Toronto. The other was developed by Cynthia Taylor of Oberlin College.

Number of Questions/Slides Available: 100+

Materials Author: Daniel Zingaro, University of Toronto
Materials Author: Cynthia Taylor, Oberlin College


Sample Peer Instruction Questions (click to enlarge):

One of the components of this function is inconsistent with the rest. Which is it?

Which of the following is best suited for a dictionary instead of a list?

What is dictionary d created by the following code?

(the above samples are from Daniel Zingaro’s version)


There are two separate editions of these materials, created independently by two authors.


Daniel Zingaro’s materials are offered under the following license:

Creative Commons License
CS1 in Python Peer Instruction Materials by Daniel Zingaro is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.
Based on a work at http://www.peerinstruction4cs.org/.
Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at http://www.peerinstruction4cs.org/.


Each lecture comes with PDF of slides, LaTex (.tex) source document for slides, suggested reading quiz questions, and python (.py) source code elaborating on code examples from the lecture slides.

Because of the large number of files, we are providing the materials as one zip file rather than individual lecture downloads, as most of the other materials at this website:

Click here to download zip file


Cynthia Taylor’s materials are offered under the following license:

Creative Commons License
CS1 in Python Peer Instruction Materials by Daniel Zingaro is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.
Based on a work at http://www.peerinstruction4cs.org/.
Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at http://www.peerinstruction4cs.org/.


These materials are bundled into tar.gz files:

IntroPython5.tar

IntroPython4.tar

IntroPython3.tar

IntroPython2.tar

IntroPython1.tar