Searching & sorting
Compare linear and binary search, then build and explain selection, bubble and insertion sort.
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Python GCSE Advanced · First Light Station
Build the rocket.
Code the mission.
Join the team at First Light Station. Recover the component catalogue, organise the payload and verify the routines that take Aurora from the hangar to its next expedition.
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Inside the adventure1:09
- Advanced
- 7 stages
- 44 assignments
The book for this course
Read the reasoning. Build the solution.
Our Python GCSE Advanced book accompanies this course. Follow an algorithm on paper, test your understanding with independent practice and bring those ideas into your next coding mission.
Book 0314 chapters · 2026
Python GCSE Advanced
Algorithms and independent projects
Coming soon Python A level book
Print visualisation · Python GCSE Advanced
Published by Code&AI Limited under its AlgoPath Coding Academy imprint. Books and online course access are separate.
A strong core · Room to explore
Skills for this adventure. And the next.
For confident Python learners ready to work with more demanding algorithms and combine their skills in independent assignments.
Core skills
Dictionaries
Keep keys and values together, update records and investigate hashing, collisions and event counts.
Recursion
Trace calls and returns, choose a base case and solve a smaller version of a problem.
Explore further
More topics you’ll meet along the way.
- Algorithm efficiency
- Maze algorithms
- Hashing & collisions
- Sets & frequencies
- Testing edge cases
- Integrated projects
Seven stages · Forty-four assignments
From the first diagnostic to the final expedition.
Each stage connects an algorithm to a mission problem. Trace it, build it and test it before combining your work in the final commissioning project.
- Stage 015 assignments
Restore mission diagnostics
Hangar arrival and first assembly
See what you’ll learn
- Read the diagnostic trace
- Recognise a valid signal run
- Count the work
- Choose an efficient calculation
- Budget temporary storage
- Stage 025 assignments
Recover the component catalogue
Hangar assembly
See what you’ll learn
- Find a component in an unsorted list
- Explain why order matters
- Build a successful binary search
- Stop a missing-target search safely
- Choose the right search
- Stage 038 assignments
Organise the cargo
Payload and shroud assembly
See what you’ll learn
- Swap two cargo positions
- Build selection sort from smaller jobs
- Trace one bubble-sort pass
- Finish bubble sort without wasted passes
- Insert one new cargo item
- Complete insertion sort
- Preserve equal-priority order
- Choose and justify a sorter
- Stage 048 assignments
Practise 2D lists and maze algorithms
Rollout and launch preparation
See what you’ll learn
- Represent the test yard as data
- Print the map accurately
- Overlay the rover without changing terrain
- Calculate a proposed move
- Reject walls and out-of-bounds moves
- Build a reliable movement test set
- Inspect every obstacle
- Validate a complete inspection route
- Stage 058 assignments
Connect the service registry
Crew boarding and launch
See what you’ll learn
- Understand dictionary keys, values and pairs
- Keep asset information together
- Update the service inventory
- Build and merge asset records
- Build a small hash-table model
- Explain collision costs and resizing
- Detect duplicate delivery IDs
- Count service events
- Stage 067 assignments
Verify the payload routines
Flight and lunar approach
See what you’ll learn
- Trace calls and returns
- Return a recursive total
- Search a smaller remainder
- Define a recurrence with factorial
- See repeated work in Fibonacci
- Reduce a number digit by digit
- Check a symmetric signal
- Stage 073 assignments
Commission the expedition
Landing and expedition
See what you’ll learn
- Assemble the commissioning pipeline
- Prove the mission can fail safely
- Commission and explain the expedition
Keep learning at your pace
Help when you need it
Replay the teaching, trace an example and ask the tutor for help with your reasoning or code. Use the assignment checks to investigate boundary cases and explain why your solution works.
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