rlcourse

Reinforcement Learning

This project is maintained by armahmood

Link back to the Syllabus

All readings are from the textbook. These readings are designed to be short, so that it should be easy to keep up with the readings.

For course material from week 11 till the end, see eclass

Office Hours:

See eClass

Note: All the office hours will be conducted over video chat. Links are posted on eclass.

Schedule:

This schedule is tentative, and is likely to change throughout the semester.

We will refer to Coursera courses as mini-courses and weeks within a mini-course as modules. Therefore, Markov Decision Processes, which is under week 2 of Coursera Course 1: Fundamentals of Reinforcement Learning will be referred to as mini-course 1, module 2.

Week Date Topic Deadlines
1 January 6, 8, 10 Introduction (Jan 6)

Worksheet in class about random variables and expectations

Probabilities & expectations

Probabilities slides (Jan 10)
In preparation for Week 2, watch videos in mini-course 1, module 1, starting with the K-Armed Bandit
2 January 13, 15, 17 Background on Statistics and Probability & the K-Armed Bandit Problem

Probabilities and Expectations review (Jan 13)

Multi-armed Bandits (Jan 15)

Worksheet about Bandit Problem
Complete Practice Quiz of mini-course 1, module 1 by midnight on Sunday, January 12 link

Complete Graded Notebook of mini-course 1, module 1 by midnight on Friday, January 17, link
3 January 20, 22, 24 Markov Decision Processes

MDP review and examples (Jan 20)

More MDP review and examples (Jan 22)

More MDP review and examples (Jan 24)

Worksheet about Markov Decision Processes
Complete Practice Quiz of mini-course 1, module 2 by midnight on Sunday, January 19 link

Complete Graded Assignment Submission of mini-course 1, module 2 by midnight on Thursday, January 23, link

Complete Graded Assignment Peer Review of mini-course 1, module 2 by midnight on Sunday, January 26, link
4 January 27, 29, 31 Value Function and Bellman Equations

Jan 27

Jan 29

Jan 31
Complete Practice Quiz of mini-course 1, module 3 by midnight on Sunday, January 26 link

Complete Graded Quiz of mini-course 1, module 3 by midnight on Friday, January 31, link
5 February 3, 5, 7 Dynamic Programming

Feb 3

Feb 5

Feb 7

Worksheet about Dynamic Programming
March 13 last day to drop course (50% fees)

Complete Practice Quiz of mini-course 1, module 4 by midnight on Sunday, Feburary 2 link

Complete Graded Notebook of mini-course 1, module 4 by midnight on Friday, Feburary 7, link
6 February 10, 12, 14 Monte Carlo Methods

Feb 10

Feb 12

Feb 14
Complete Practice Notebook of mini-course 2, module 1 by midnight on Sunday, Feburary 9, link

Complete Graded Quiz of mini-course 2, module 1 by midnight on Friday, Feburary 14, link
7 February 17, 19, 21 No classes: Reading week  
8 February 24, 26, 28 Temporal Difference Methods for prediction

Feb 24

Feb 26

Feb 28
Complete Practice Quiz of mini-course 2, module 2 by midnight on Sunday, Feburary 23, link

Complete Graded Notebook of mini-course 2, module 2 by midnight on Friday, Feburary 28, link
9 March 2, 4, 6 Temporal Difference Methods for control

Mar 2

Mar 4

Mar 6
Complete Practice Quiz of mini-course 2, module 3 by midnight on Sunday, March 1, link

Complete Graded Notebook of mini-course 2, module 3 by midnight on Friday, March 6, link
10 March 9, 11, 13 Planning, Learning and Acting

Mar 9

Mar 11
Complete Practice Quiz of mini-course 2, module 4 by midnight on Sunday, March 8, link

Complete Graded Notebook of mini-course 2, module 4 by midnight on Friday, March 13, link
11 March 16, 18, 20 Midterm: review, practice and exam Midterm on March 20
12 March 23, 25, 27 Prediction with Approximation Complete Practice Quiz of mini-course 3, module 1 by midnight on Sunday, March 22, link

Complete Graded Notebook of mini-course 3, module 1 by midnight on Friday, March 27, link
13 March 30, April 1, 3 Constructing Features for Prediction & Control with Approximation Complete Practice Quiz of mini-course 3, module 2 by midnight on Sunday, March 29, link

Complete Graded Notebook of mini-course 3, module 2 by midnight on Friday, April 3, link
14 April 6, 8 Control with Approximation & Course Review Complete Practice Quiz of mini-course 3, module 3 by midnight on Sunday, April 5, link

Complete Graded Notebook of mini-course 3, module 3 by midnight on Friday, April 10, link

Complete Capstone Project of mini-course 4 by midnight on Sunday, April 19. It consists of 2 Graded Quizzes and 2 Graded Notebooks (quiz1, quiz2, notebook1, notebook2)
Final April 20 at 9:00 a.m. (tentative) Check Bear Tracks to ensure Final Exam You can bring a two page cheat-sheet