What is sorting?

This repository is a coding exercise for students learning to program. It walks through implementing several classic sorting algorithms, methods for putting a list of numbers in order from smallest to largest. The project is part of a curriculum from Lambda School (a coding bootcamp), designed to be completed over about two days. The exercise is structured in parts. Students start with simpler approaches like bubble sort and selection sort, which work by repeatedly comparing and swapping numbers in a list. Then they move on to merge sort, a more efficient but trickier algorithm that uses recursion, meaning it solves the problem by breaking the list into smaller pieces and combining the results. The repo includes test files so students can check whether their implementations actually work. There are also stretch goals for faster students, like implementing timsort, the algorithm Python itself uses under the hood for its built-in sorting. What makes this project notable is its learning philosophy. Students are explicitly told not to search for code online. They can read descriptions, watch videos, or look at pseudocode, but they have to write the actual implementation themselves. The reasoning is that translating a plain-English description of an algorithm into working code is a core skill developers use constantly, and copying someone else's code bypasses that practice entirely. This repo would be used by beginner to intermediate programming students who are learning about algorithms and efficiency. It's not something a founder or PM would deploy, it's a teaching tool. If you're a vibe coder curious about how computers sort data, or wondering what a structured coding education looks like, this gives you a clear picture of one common exercise.