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IBM

Machine Learning: Deep & Reinforcement Learning

IBM via edX

Overview

This course explores two of the most dynamic and in-demand areas of machine learning: Deep Learning and Reinforcement Learning. You’ll begin by diving into Deep Learning, a subset of machine learning that powers many modern AI systems—from image and speech recognition to natural language processing.

The course introduces the foundational theory behind neural networks, explaining how they are structured, how they learn, and why they are effective for handling complex, high-dimensional data. You’ll gain hands-on experience building and training neural networks and explore modern deep learning architectures that are widely used in industry.

You’ll then move on to Reinforcement Learning (RL), a rapidly growing field in AI that focuses on decision-making and learning through interaction with an environment. Reinforcement Learning has practical applications in research, across robotics, autonomous systems, game-playing AI, and beyond. You’ll learn the key concepts of RL, including agents, environments, actions, rewards, and policies, and how these elements work together in the learning process.

By the end of this course, you will have developed a strong understanding of how Deep Learning and Reinforcement Learning differ from traditional supervised and unsupervised learning approaches. You’ll also be able to design, build, and interpret basic deep learning models, as well as grasp the foundational principles that drive reinforcement learning strategies.

Syllabus

Course Introduction

  • Video: Course Introduction

Module 1: Introduction to Neural Networks

  • Reading: Learning Objectives

  • Video: Introduction to Neural Networks

  • Video: Basics of Neurons

  • Video: Neural Networks with Sigmoid Function

  • Video: Neuron in Action

  • Video: Neural Networks with SKlearn

  • App Item: Neural Networks with Sklearn

  • Video: Forward Propagation

  • Video: Matrix Representation of Forward Propagation

  • Video: Main Types of Deep Neural Network

  • App Item: Introduction to Neural Networks Demo (Activity)

  • Video: (Optional) Introduction to Neural Networks Notebook - Part 1

  • Video: (Optional) Introduction to Neural Networks Notebook - Part 2

  • Practice Assignment: Introduction to Neural Networks

  • Video: Gradient Descent Basics

  • Video: Compare Different Gradient Descent Methods

  • App Item: Gradient Descent Demo (Activity)

  • Video: (Optional) Gradient Descent Notebook - Part 1

  • Video: (Optional) Gradient Descent Notebook - Part 2

  • Video: (Optional) Gradient Descent Notebook - Part 3

  • Practice Assignment: Optimization and Gradient Descent

  • Reading: Summary/Review

  • Module 1 Graded Quiz

Module 2: Back Propagation Training and Keras

  • Reading: Learning Objectives

  • Video: How to Train a Neural Network

  • Video: Backpropagation

  • App Item: Backpropagation Demo (Activity)

  • Video: (Optional) Backpropagation Notebook - Part 1

  • Video: (Optional) Backpropagation Notebook - Part 2

  • Video: The Sigmoid Activation Function

  • Video: Other Popular Activation Functions

  • Video: (Optional) Backpropagation Notebook - Part 3

  • Practice Assignment: Practice: Back Propagation, Activation Functions

  • Video: Popular Deep Learning Library

  • Video: A Typical Keras Workflow

  • Video: Implementing an Example Neural Network in Keras

  • App Item: Keras Demo (Activity)

  • Video: (Optional) Keras Notebook - Part 1

  • Video: (Optional) Keras Notebook - Part 2

  • Video: (Optional) Keras Notebook - Part 3

  • App Item: Regression with Keras

  • App Item: (Optional) Loading Images with Keras

  • Practice Assignment: Keras Library

  • Reading: Summary/Review

  • Module 2 Graded Quiz

Module 3: Neural Network Optimizers

  • Reading: Learning Objectives

  • Video: Optimizers and Momentum

  • Video: Regularization Techniques for Deep Learning

  • Video: Popular Optimizers

  • Video: Details of Training Neural Networks

  • Reading: Learning Rate Scheduler Reading

  • Video: Data Shuffling

  • App Item: Optimizers

  • App Item: Grid Search with Keras

  • Video: Transforms

  • Practice Assignment: Optimizers and Data Shuffling

  • Reading: Summary/Review

  • Module 3 Graded Quiz

Module 4: Convolutional Neural Networks

  • Reading: Learning Objectives

  • Video: Categorical Cross Entropy

  • App Item: Categorical Cross Entropy

  • Video: Introduction to Convolutional Neural Networks (CNN)

  • Video: Images Dataset

  • Video: Kernels

  • Video: Convolution for Color Images

  • App Item: Images Convolution

  • Video: Convolutional Settings - Padding and Stride

  • App Item: Padding, Pooling, and Stride

  • Video: Convolutional Settings - Depth and Pooling

  • App Item: Channels and Flattening

  • App Item: Training the Network

  • App Item: Convolutional Neural Networks Demo (Activity)

  • Video: (Optional) Demo CNN Notebook - Part 1

  • Video: (Optional) Demo CNN Notebook - Part 2

  • Practice Assignment: Convolutional Neural Networks

  • Reading: Summary/Review

  • Module 4 Graded Quiz

Module 5: Transfer Learning

  • Reading: Learning Objectives

  • Video: Introduction to Transfer Learning

  • Video: Transfer Learning and Fine Tuning

  • App Item: Transfer Learning Demo (Activity)

  • Video: (Optional) Transfer Learning Notebook

  • Practice Assignment: Transfer Learning

  • Video: Convolutional Neural Network Architectures – LeNet

  • Video: Convolutional Neural Network Architectures – AlexNet

  • Video: VGG

  • Video: Convolutional Neural Network Architectures – Inception

  • Video: Convolutional Neural Network Architectures – ResNet

  • App Item: Types of Model APIs in Keras

  • App Item: Transfer Learning Examples with Existing Architectures

  • Practice Assignment: Convolutional Neural Network Architectures

  • Reading: Regularization

  • App Item: Regularization Techniques

  • Practice Assignment: Regularization

  • Reading: Summary/Review

  • Module 5 Graded Quiz

Module 6: Recurrent Neural Networks and Long-Short Term Memory Networks

  • Reading: Learning Objectives

  • Video: Recurrent Neural Networks (RNNs)

  • Video: State and Recurrent Neural Networks

  • App Item: (Optional) Introduction to Sequential Data

  • App Item: Existing Recurrent Neural Networks

  • Video: Details Recurrent Neural Networks

  • App Item: Word Embeddings

  • App Item: Recurrent Neural Networks Demo (Activity)

  • Video: (Optional) Recurrent Neural Networks Notebook - Part 1

  • Video: (Optional) Recurrent Neural Networks Notebook - Part 2

  • Practice Assignment: Recurrent Neural Networks

  • Video: Long-Short Term Memory (LSTM) Networks

  • Video: LSTM Explanation

  • Video: Gated Recurrent Unit

  • Video: Gated Recurrent Unit Details

  • App Item: LSTM and GRU Demo (Activity)

  • Practice Assignment: LSTM and GRU

  • Reading: Summary/Review

  • Module 6: Graded Quiz

Module 7: Autoencoders

  • Reading: Learning Objectives

  • Video: Introduction to Autoencoders

  • Video: Autoencoders

  • Ungraded Plugin: Transposed Convolution Reading

  • App Item: Autoencoders

  • Practice Assignment: Autoencoders

  • Autoencoders Demo (Activity)

  • Video: (Optional) Autoencoders Notebook - Part 1

  • Video: (Optional) Autoencoders Notebook - Part 2

  • Video: (Optional) Autoencoders Notebook - Part 3

  • Video: (Optional) Autoencoders Notebook - Part 4

  • Video: (Optional) Autoencoders Notebook - Part 5

  • Reading: Summary/Review

  • Module 7 Graded Quiz

Module 8: Generative Models and Applications of Deep Learning

  • Reading: Learning Objectives

  • Video: What is a Variational Autoencoder

  • Video: How Variational Autoencoders Work

  • App Item: Variational Autoencoder

  • Practice Assignment: Variational Autoencoders

  • Video: Introduction to GANs

  • Video: How GANS Work

  • Video: Issues with Training GANS

  • App Item: GANS Lab 1

  • App Item: GANS Lab 2

  • Video: Additional Topics in Deep Learning

  • App Item: GPU with Keras

  • Video: Model Agnostic Explainable AI

  • Practice Assignment: Generative Adversarial Networks

  • Reading: Summary/Review

  • Module 8 Graded Quiz

Module 9: Reinforcement Learning

  • Reading: Learning Objectives

  • Video: Reinforcement Learning (RL)

  • App Item: Reinforcement Learning Demo (Activity)

  • Video: (Optional) Reinforcement Learning Notebook - Part 1

  • Video: (Optional) Reinforcement Learning Notebook - Part 2

  • Video: (Optional) Reinforcement Learning Notebook - Part 3

  • Video: (Optional) Reinforcement Learning Notebook - Part 4

  • Practice Assignment: Reinforcement Learning

  • Reading: Summary/Review

  • Module 9 Graded Quiz

  • Peer Review: Final Project

  • Reading: Thanks from the Course Team

Taught by

Joseph Santarcangelo and Skills Network

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