This is a **solid path** for those of you who want to complete a **Computer Science** course on your own time, **for free**, with courses from the **best universities** in the World.
In our curriculum, we give preference to MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) style courses because these courses were created with our style of learning in mind.
The first one is a motivational video that shows a guy that went through the "MIT Challenge", which consists of learning the entire **4-year** MIT curriculum for Computer Science in **1 year**.
The second link is a MOOC that will teach you learning techniques used by experts in art, music, literature, math, science, sports, and many other disciplines. These are **fundamental abilities** to succeed in our journey.
[How to Code: Systematic Program Design - Part 1](https://www.edx.org/course/how-code-systematic-program-design-part-ubcx-spd1x)| 5 weeks | 8-12 hours/week
[How to Code: Systematic Program Design - Part 2](https://www.edx.org/course/how-code-systematic-program-design-part-ubcx-spd2x)| 5 weeks | 8-12 hours/week
[How to Code: Systematic Program Design - Part 3](https://www.edx.org/course/how-code-systematic-program-design-part-ubcx-spd3x)| 5 weeks | 8-12 hours/week
[Introduction to Probability - The Science of Uncertainty](https://www.edx.org/course/introduction-probability-science-mitx-6-041x-0)| 16 weeks | 12 hours/week
The courses are **already** in the order you should complete them. Just start in the [Introduction to Computer Science](#introduction-to-computer-science) section and after finishing the first course, start the next one.
1. Copy [this](https://trello.com/b/9DPXYv5f) board to your personal account. See how to copy a board [here](http://blog.trello.com/you-can-copy-boards-now-finally/).
Now that you have a copy of our official board, you just need to pass the cards to the `Doing` column or `Done` column as you progress in your study.
We also have **labels** to help you have more control through the process. The meaning of each of these labels is:
-`Main Curriculum`: cards with that label represent courses that are listed in our curriculum.
-`Extra Courses`: cards with that label represent courses that was added by the student.
-`Doing`: cards with that label represent courses the student is current doing.
-`Done`: cards with that label represent courses finished by the student. Those cards should also have the link for at least one project/article built with the knowledge acquired in such course.
-`Section`: cards with that label represent the section that we have in our curriculum. Those cards with the `Section` label are only to help the organization of the Done column. You should put the *Course's cards* below its respective *Section's card*.
-`Extra Sections`: cards with that label represent sections that was added by the student.
The intention of this board is to provide for our students a way to track their progress, and also the ability to show their progress through a public page for friends, family, employers, etc. You can change the status of your board to be **public** or **private**.
It may take longer to complete all of the classes compared to a regular CS course, but I can **guarantee** you that your **reward** will be proportional to **your motivation/dedication**!
You must focus on your **habit**, and **forget** about goals. Try to invest 1 ~ 2 hours **every day** studying this curriculum. If you do this, **inevitably** you'll finish this curriculum.
> See more about "Commit to a process, not a goal" [here](http://jamesclear.com/goals-systems).
After you finish a course, you should think about a **real world problem** that you can solve using the acquired knowledge in the course. You don't need to create a big project, but you must create something to **validate** and **consolidate** your knowledge, and also to show to the world that you are capable to create something useful with the concepts that you learned.
Put the OSSU-CS badge in the README of your repository! [](https://github.com/open-source-society/computer-science)
- Markdown: `[](https://github.com/open-source-society/computer-science)`
- HTML: `<a href="https://github.com/open-source-society/computer-science"><img alt="Open Source Society University - Computer Science" src="https://img.shields.io/badge/OSSU-computer--science-blue.svg"></a>`
- [Projects](https://github.com/karan/Projects): A list of practical projects that anyone can solve in any programming language.
- [app-specs](https://github.com/ericdouglas/app-specs): A curated list of applications specifications and implementations to practice new technologies, improve your portfolio and sharpen your skills.
- [FreeCodeCamp](http://www.freecodecamp.com/): Course that teaches you fullstack JavaScript development through a bunch of projects.
- [JavaScript Projects](https://github.com/javascript-society/javascript-projects): List of projects related with the [JavaScript Path](https://github.com/javascript-society/javascript-path).
You **need** to have in mind that what you are able to **create** with the concepts that you learned will be your certificate **and this is what really matters**!
In order to show that you **really** learned those things, you need to be **creative**!
Here are some tips about how you can do that:
- **Articles**: create blog posts to synthesize/summarize what you learned.
- **GitHub repository**: keep your course's files organized in a GH repository, so in that way other students can use it to study with your annotations.
**We love cooperative work**! Use our [channels](#community) to communicate with other fellows to combine and create new projects!
### Which programming languages should I use?
My friend, here is the best part of liberty! You can use **any** language that you want to complete the courses.
The **important** thing for each course is to **internalize** the **core concepts** and to be able to use them with whatever tool (programming language) that you wish.
### Content Policy
You must share **only** files that you are **allowed** to! **Do NOT disrespect the code of conduct** that you signed in the beginning of some courses.
[Be creative](#be-creative) in order to show your progress! :smile:
To show **respect** to all of our students, we will keep a [CHANGELOG](CHANGELOG.md) file that contains all the alterations that our curriculum may suffer.
Now we have a **stable** version of the curriculum, which won't change anymore, only in exceptional cases (outdated courses, broken links, etc).
Our students can **trust** in this curriculum because it has been **carefully planned** and covers **all** the **core topics** that a conventional Computer Science course covers.
We also include modern topics, making this course one of the **best options** for those who want to become a Computer Scientist and/or a Software Engineer/Developer.
You can [open an issue](https://help.github.com/articles/creating-an-issue/) and give us your suggestions as to how we can improve this guide, or what we can do to improve the learning experience.
You can also [fork this project](https://help.github.com/articles/fork-a-repo/) and send a [pull request](https://help.github.com/articles/using-pull-requests/) to fix any mistakes that you have found.
If you want to suggest a new resource, send a pull request adding such resource to the [extras](https://github.com/open-source-society/computer-science/tree/master/extras) section.
The **extras** section is a place where all of us will be able to submit interesting additional articles, books, courses and specializations, keeping our curriculum *as immutable and concise as possible*.
We also have a chat room! [](https://gitter.im/open-source-society/computer-science?utm_campaign=pr-badge&utm_content=badge&utm_medium=badge&utm_source=badge)
> **ps**: A forum is an ideal way to interact with other students as we do not lose important discussions, which usually occur in communication via chat apps. **Please use our subreddit/group for important discussions**.
