Thanks to the Internet, there are a plethora of educational resources available to us. Quite honestly, if you set your mind to it, you could probably find all the resources necessary for attaining a solid education on any subject online.
“Well, that sounds great — I’d love to learn about [fill in the blank],” you might think, “but I lack the motivation, time and discipline to do that.”
Look no further. Here is a list of online resources I’ve compiled that have helped me further my knowledge in subjects outside of the traditional school classroom.
1. Khan Academy
Khan Academy is the mother of online learning. Founded in 2005, Khan Academy makes videos on just about every subject you can think of, and you’ve probably watched one at some point in your life. But did you know that Khan Academy has amazing interactive practice questions and even personalizes your learning experience based on your prior knowledge? Khan Academy is the perfect destination for strengthening your skills in an AP class or for pursuing an interest outside of the classroom. Plus, it's free! Just last year, Khan Academy partnered with the CollegeBoard to create a personalized learning experience for SAT test preparation.
A fun fact about Khan Academy is that its founder, Salman Khan, started Khan Academy by himself as a way to tutor his cousins, and now, it's grown to over 80 members with resources translated into over 36 languages!
2. Codecademy
How many times have you heard someone say that they’re a “self-taught” programmer and felt jealous? Yeah, me too. For you aspiring programmers out there, Codecademy is everything you could wish for, offering interactive classes on Java, Python, CSS, HTML, JavaScript and more. Codecademy allows you to run code from its step-by-step tutorials that will walk you through the basics of many different programming languages and projects. Whether you have never seen any code in your life, or you’re just looking to brush up on your skills, you are bound to learn something interesting while joining 25 million others on Codecademy.
3. MIT OpenCourseWare
It’s exactly what it sounds like. In 2001, MIT pioneered the effort to “publish all of our course materials online and make them widely available to everyone." What makes MIT OCW so different from the “traditional” online course is that course material is directly from the institute itself! Recorded course lectures are posted online, and course material is always available. With materials from 2340 courses, MIT OCW has opened the minds of 200 million visitors and counting. You don’t even need a log-in to access this wealth of information, and it’s free.
There are many other colleges that share a similar mission regarding open online education. Here are just a few: Open Yale Courses, Carnegie Mellon Open Learning Initiative, Stanford Online and Harvard Online Learning.
4. DuoLingo
Looking to learn a foreign language? DuoLingo makes this all the more possible with interactive lessons that will teach you how to read, speak and listen to a new language. From Spanish to Klingon to Vietnamese, DuoLingo offers a wide range of selections that are still presently growing. The best part is that DuoLingo is available on many platforms, including Apple and Android!
