AI Foundations
beginnerFor students and professionals who already use ChatGPT, Claude, Copilot or Gemini — but know they're only scratching the surface. Build an accurate picture of what these assistants can really do, master the plain-English prompting patterns that 10× your results, and apply them to real work: better reports, spreadsheets, presentations, analysis, and decisions. No code, no jargon. Four weeks, hands-on, feedback as you go.
Never written code? You can still start here.
Module 0 opens with 18 lessons of programming from nothing: your first program, variables, loops, functions, reading errors, the terminal, Git and arrays, before any of the AI Foundations material. No prior coding assumed.
What you'll learn
~19 h guided · about 4 weeks at 5 h/week · +4 h on projects
- Explain why ChatGPT and Claude generate answers rather than looking them up like a search engine
- Identify the three pieces of context every prompt needs: background, audience and purpose
- Can write a summary-spec (audience + length + focus + format) for any document
- Turn a vague decision into a trade-off table with explicit criteria
- Adopt the "brief a colleague, don't query a search box" mental model
- Paste real material (threads, drafts, data) into a prompt instead of describing it
- Can extract dates, owners and commitments from a report into a clean table
- Use devil's advocate and pre-mortem prompts to stress-test a plan
Curriculum
0/20 lessonsWeek 1 — What AI Can Actually Do
Week 1 · 5 lessons
Beyond the chatbox: what AI assistants really are
How the model "thinks" — and why it changes how you ask
The capability map: what AI does brilliantly
The limits: hallucination, freshness, and what never to trust it with
Your first real win: turn a 30-minute task into 3
Week 2 — The Prompting Patterns That 10× Your Results
Week 2 · 5 lessons
Context is everything: give it what it needs to know
Give it a role and a goal
Constraints and format: define what "good" looks like
Show, don't tell: examples and templates
Iterate like a pro: steer, don't restart
Week 3 — Prompting Across Real Work
Week 3 · 5 lessons
Documents and reports: summarise, extract, and draft better
Spreadsheets and data: Excel formulas, analysis, and charts
Presentations: from blank page to a solid deck
Long, messy input: transcripts, threads, notes, and screenshots
ChatGPT, Claude, Copilot, Gemini: which to reach for, and when
Week 4 — Build Your AI Workflows
Week 4 · 5 lessons
Make smarter decisions: AI as your thinking partner
Chaining steps: multi-part tasks done reliably
Your prompt library: reusable templates that save hours
Staying safe: privacy, accuracy, and company data
Capstone: do a real task end-to-end (graded) → your certificate
What you'll build
1 project · ~4 h · each graded against a rubric
Exit Artifact: Your AI Workflow Portfolio
beginner · ~4 h
ChatGPT/ClaudePrompt systems
What we track
Everything below is graded by Nova and kept on your record: the thing an employer can open, run and verify.
- Every lesson completed →
Mastery per lesson from the spaced-retrieval cards, and your streak.
- Every exercise, graded →
Nova grades each one and keeps the grade — no self-marking.
- Every project, scored against a rubric →
The score, the feedback and the repo, on your portfolio for an employer to run.
- Your skill report →
The placement assessment maps your level topic by topic and updates as you re-check.
- The certificate →
Issued on completion, verifiable by anyone at /verify, addable to LinkedIn.
Get started
A senior, self-paced track with no placement test. Jump straight into lesson 1, free.
Featured projects
Exit Artifact: Your AI Workflow Portfolio
About
The people behind this track
Nova grades every submission; these are the humans who wrote the brief and stand behind it.