Top Free Online Learning Sites
I am constantly amazed at all the free online educational sites on the Internet. These sites are available to anyone who wants to put in the time to learn new things or update an existing skillset. What is truly remarkable is the quality of the content available for FREE! This is due in part to the countless hours put in by educators, entrepreneurs, teachers, programmers, web developers, philanthropists, as well as many other folks who on many occasions volunteer their time freely to make the Internet a place where folks can continue to learn on their own pace. Click the image to take you to a PCMag blog listing even more free online educational sites.
This post recognizes a few of my favorite sites offering free online courses that I have personally used. If you have a thirst for knowledge then one of the sites mentioned below will certainly quench that thirst. Good luck and happy learning!
Coursera
Coursera has to be my favorite online educational site available. It is a community collaboration of universities and organizations all over the world offering a diverse line of courses in many different areas such as business, computer science, humanities, etc. These courses are video led and test your knowledge throughout the course timeline. If you happened to start the course on the actual start date, you will have assignments, homework, quizzes and tests. Many of the courses offer a certificate of completion (if you pass). However, you can still take the course after its initial start date and work at your own pace. You will not receive a certificate upon completion however but who cares as long as you learn something. I highly recommend this site.
Khan Academy
Here is another good site that is completely 100% free. It has a lot of math, economic, financial and other relevant content available. They cover interesting topics that you would not find on a conventional site like Coursera. For example, when the financial crisis was happening in Greece, it was all over the news. You couldn’t hit a news channel that didn’t make mention of this crisis. So the curiosity got the better of me and I went to the Internet to find out more about it. Khan Academy had a fantastic session discussing this topic in a piece called Why Europe is worried about Greece. Very educational for me.
Stanford University
Several universities are offering free online courses now but I think Stanford was one of the first and is also one of the best. They also offer many of their courses through Coursera and NovoEd.
TED
Many people already know about TED conferences. These conferences have drawn famous speakers and has covered talks on many different topics. I regularly visit this site to see what is new. One of the best talks I ever listened to has to be Steve Jobs at Stanford’s commencement titled How to live before you die. Truly inspirational. If this doesn’t get you off the couch then nothing will.
There are many other learning opportunities out there. These are just a few of my favorites. I hope you find this helpful.
