Here is my updated learning plan, incorporating some of the feedback that I received.
Learning plan
1. Write small programs without worrying about style. (CodeEval, Topcoder)
2. When sufficient number (5) of programs has been completed, go through each of them and find the 2 most common variations from PEP8. If no differences are found go to step 5.
3. Write more small programs, keeping in mind the 2 differences identified.
4. Go to step 2.
5. Write a medium sized c program.
6. Translate that to python.
7. Check it for variations from PEP8, if found repeat steps 2 and 3 with medium sized programs, else go to 8.
8. Start an open source project in Python. Check it thoroughly for PEP8 compliant, invite others to do this.
Metrics
Number of differences from PEP8 per 100 lines of coding.
Number of surprises in the code for a python expert.
