Trying to Understand 2NF

[php master race]

HI everyone, 

So I am trying to fully comprehend normalization. So please correct me if I am wrong in my definitions. 

1. First normal form. A 1NF table should be atomic and each horizontal line should contain only one value that is indivisible.

So if I have a table of students and each row would have a student id, first name and the courses the person is taking. This following table would not be 1NF since courses column is not atomic. We need to thus change everything to atomic.

 

So would this be atomic and thus be in 1NF?

2. So if i put my table correctly into 1NF. How would I put it in 2NF? Do i put student id and first name on a different table? But what would i do with the courses column?

 

Thank you for your time. 

[Larry]

You're definitely on the right path! The next step would be start creating additional tables. For example, you'd want a students table that maps student IDs to the student's name. That's all I'll say for now so you can continue to learn yourself, but let me know if you have more questions.