You can teach a person the basics of a programming language like Python in a week... but that doesn't mean they'll be able to code effectively. Programming is at its heart a craft, the more that you actively practice it the more you'll improve. Aptitude and an affinity for logical thinking and problem solving go a long way as well.

It's like a foreign language, you can acquire a vocabulary of several thousand words using flashcards over a month, but that doesn't mean you're going to be able to actually communicate.