Today, I’m excited to announce we’ve collaborated with Codecademy on a new, free, course series on how to build Alexa skills. Codecademy is an online education company that’s teaching 45 million learners how to code and revolutionizing education through a free, interactive platform. Starting today, budding developers and advanced programmers can learn about Alexa skill-building through the online, interactive learning interface that Codecademy provides.

What You’ll Learn

One of the best ways to learn a new technology is by doing. The new Learn Alexa series on Codecademy is designed to do just that. The course walks you through the skill-building process step-by-step, and explains skill-building concepts along the way.

In the two-part introductory course, you will learn to build skills for Alexa using the Alexa Skills Kit and Amazon Web Services (AWS). In the first course, Build Your First Skill, we will walk you through creating the voice user interface (VUI), the front-end for your skill. Then, in the second course called Create Your Lambda Function, you will connect the VUI to your code running on AWS Lambda. In the coming months, we will open two more courses that are designed for deeper learning. For information on the subsequent courses, stay tuned by signing up for the first courses.

In the first two courses, you will gain understanding of various skill-building concepts like the interaction model, intents, sample utterances, the new Skill Builder, and more. You will also create your first skill and test your skill using the Service Simulator and Echosim.io by iQuarius Media. What’s more, you will get an introduction to the Node.js Alexa SDK library, which makes it fast and easy to build skills.

Get Quizzed

At the end of each course, we provide two ways to test and practice what you learned. You can take the multiple-choice quiz to test your knowledge. You can also tackle an optional project that puts your skill-building knowledge to use.

Get Started

Visit the first introductory courses on Codecademy to start learning today. And stay tuned for additional course announcements later this year.

Build a Skill, Earn Developer Perks

Got skills? Bring your big idea to life with the Alexa Skills Kit and earn perks through our new tiered rewards system. Publish a skill in September, and earn a pair of limited-edition Alexa dev socks. If 100 unique users use your skill in its first 30 days in the Alexa Skills Store, you can also apply to receive a free Echo Dot featuring a limited-edition developer skin design. Learn more about our promotion and start building today.