JetBrains has launched an educational edition of PyCharm which does more than act as an editor and development environment. It bundles interactive online lessons that introduce new users to Python to the language and to the IDE's tools at the same time. 

The PyCharm IDE was already available in a free Community Edition that could be used in education, so why do we now have another version? 

The answer is that, rather than being a cut down version, the new PyCharm Educational Edition has extra features to meet the needs of both learners and educators. For learners it has everything you need to get started - both Python and an interactive programming course to get you started using it.

For teachers it provides the ability to create an interactive couse using a Course Creation Wizard. This can either be added to the JetBrain's PyCharm public repository - where it adds to the list of resources available to all PyCharm users - or shared privately with a class.

To make it all the more accessible, there's a Getting Started video in which Hadi Hariri guides beginners through its teaching facilities:

PyCharm Educational Edition will get newcomers started but it doesn't stop that that point. It has the same tools that professional developers use, although advanced ones are hidden by default as part of its simplified interface to make the learning curve as easy as possible. The post announcing it quotes Guido van Rossum, Python's creator, who said:

“We believe that there should be no clear-cut distinction between tools used by professionals and tools used for education—just as professional writers use the same language and alphabet as their readers!”

JetBrain's decision to create this educational resource is a response to Python currently being the most popular language for teaching Computer Science - a trend that it will reinforce by making it possible to take and make Python courses. 

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