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Coding · Grade 11

Data Structures and Their Tradeoffs

Learners compare dynamic arrays with linked lists, trace a toy hash table with buckets and collisions to see why dictionaries are fast and keys must be immutable, and build binary search trees, observing how insertion order changes their height and performance. They then choose structures for realistic workloads by comparing the costs of the operations that matter most.

  • 4 lessons
  • About 100 minutes
  • Check what you learned: 8 questions
  • Ways to answer: choose an answer, trace code, match pairs, type a number, sort into groups and true or false
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What learners will discover

  • Compare dynamic arrays and linked lists by the cost of access, insertion and removal.
  • Explain and trace hash tables, including hashing to buckets, collisions, resizing and immutable keys.
  • Trace binary search tree insertion, search and in-order traversal, and relate height to performance.
  • Choose a data structure for a workload by comparing the costs of its most frequent operations.

Lessons

  1. Arrays versus linked lists 5 steps2 practiceabout 22 min
  2. Hash tables 5 steps3 practiceabout 22 min
  3. Binary search trees 6 steps4 practiceabout 24 min
  4. Choosing a structure for a workload 4 steps2 practiceabout 18 min
  5. Check what you learned 8 questions at the end

Keep exploring

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