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Hi, I'm Pedram Badakhchani, Head of eLearning at the University of Cambridge Language Centre, a full-stack developer and AI engineer, and an online tutor on the BSc Computer Science from Goldsmiths, University of London, the first undergraduate degree offered on Coursera.

I started out in neuroscience research before moving into web development, and I've been building digital learning at Cambridge for over twenty years. I spent fifteen years as the Language Centre's senior full-stack web developer, creating interactive multimedia courses, blended-learning projects and award-winning distance-learning programmes. Since 2019 I've led the Centre's eLearning team, which designs, builds and supports its online resources and its use of Moodle. I also advise colleagues on how technology, and increasingly AI, can support language teaching, learning and assessment.

Recent projects include:

  • a pronunciation-feedback app that helps learners of Persian hear the short vowels their script leaves out, built with speech alignment in Django;
  • Django 5 and Tailwind apps for language advising;
  • a template for building online language courses quickly.

I've also been an online tutor on the Goldsmiths BSc since 2019, supporting students through the programming, web, graphics and database modules below. This blog is where I write the tutorials I wish every student had: set-up guides, clear explanations of the ideas that trip people up, and worked examples you can run yourself.

These posts are my own supplementary material, not official course content. Each tutorial says which versions it uses near the top. Course materials sometimes use older versions, so check which ones you're working with.

Module guides

Each guide gathers the posts that help with that module, grouped by topic. Posts that are useful for several modules appear in each relevant guide.

Useful for every module

Find me elsewhere

GitHub · LinkedIn · p5.js sketches