During these summer months, we’ve been busy rummaging around the internet and adding new courses to our big list of Free Online Courses, which now features 1,150 courses from top universities. Let’s give you the quick overview: The list lets you download audio & video lectures from schools like Stanford, Yale, MIT, Oxford and Harvard. Generally, the courses can be accessed via YouTube, iTunes or university web sites, and you can listen to the lectures anytime, anywhere, on your computer or smart phone. We didn’t do a precise calculation, but there’s probably about 35,000 hours of free audio & video lectures here. Enough to keep you busy for a very long time. READ MORE: A Master List of 1,150 Free Courses From Top Universities: 35,000 Hours of Audio/Video Lectures | Open Culture.
Tag Archives: MOOCs
Free: Neil deGrasse Tyson’s Short Course, The Inexplicable Universe | Open Culture + #CampGoogle For Kids | Camp.WithGoogle #MOOCs #science
Free: Download Neil deGrasse Tyson’s Short Course, The Inexplicable Universe, in Audio or Video Format | Open Culture
For now, The Great Courses will let you access Tyson’s Great Course for free, including all of its downloadable audio and video lectures, as long as you make an account at their site — a process which, we can report, entails only a reasonable hassle factor.
Camp Google | Camp.WithGoogle.com
Camp Google is a free summer camp that gets kids learning through fun, interactive science activities and adventures. Led by experts, the activities have been designed to encourage kids to ask questions, setting them on a lifelong journey of exploration and discovery. Everyone is welcome, and you can jump in anytime.
43 #Free Career-Advancing #Courses You Can Take (And Actually Finish) This Summer | Mashable #skills #education #MOOCs
Yes, summer is the perfect time to relax and recharge. But, it’s also the perfect time to pick up a few new skills. Put that relaxed brain (and work schedule) to good use! How accomplished would you feel if, when September rolls around, you could open up your resume and add another skill to it? Very, we’re guessing.
Before you start stressing, know that we’re not asking you to sacrifice your summer nights to a droning professor. Instead, we’re suggesting devoting a few hours every week to advancing your career with an online class. (Online equals your couch and your sweats and an optional glass of wine.)
To make the process easier for you, we did two things. One, we only chose classes you can complete in less than 10 weeks (with some that can be completed in an hour). Two, we hand-curated this list to ensure it’s only courses that are valuable and interesting. The best part? All of them are free. So, without further ado, here are 43 classes you can sign up for today.
READ MORE: 43 free career-advancing courses you can take (and actually finish) this summer | Mashable
Take a Free Course on Film Noir; Then Watch Oodles of Free Noir Films Online | Open Culture #MOOCs #filmnoir
Cinephiles, if you have some spare time in the coming months and feel like watching, say, over 100 film noir movies from the Turner Classic Movie (TCM) vaults, then you will be delighted with Summer of Darkness, which will devote every Friday, from June through July, to 24 hours of noir classics and rarities. And suppose you’d like a reward, like a certificate that proves you not only watched those movies, but properly studied them? Well TCM has that covered too, offering a free nine-week course in “The Case of Film Noir” to run concurrent with the series. It’s free to sign up, and the course runs June 1 – August 4.
READ MORE: Take a Free Course on Film Noir; Then Watch Oodles of Free Noir Films Online | Open Culture.
125 MOOCs Getting Started in May: Enroll in One Today | Open Culture #MOOCs
Kapow! Stan Lee Is Co-Teaching a Free Comic Book MOOC, and You Can Enroll for Free | Open Culture
“Why did superheroes first arise in 1938 and experience what we refer to as their ‘Golden Age’ during World War II?” “How have comic books, published weekly since the mid-1930’s, mirrored a changing American society, reflecting our mores, slang, fads, biases and prejudices?” “Why was the comic book industry nearly shut down in the McCarthy Era of the 1950’s?” And “When and how did comic book artwork become accepted as a true American art form as indigenous to this country as jazz?”
All of these questions … and more … will be explored in an upcoming MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) co-taught by the legendary comic book artist, Stan Lee. He will be joined by experts from the Smithsonian, and Michael Uslan, the producer of the Batman movies who’s also considered the first instructor to have taught an accredited course on comic book folklore at any university.
The course called The Rise of Superheroes and Their Impact On Pop Culture will be offered through edX, starting on May 5th.
MORE: Kapow! Stan Lee Is Co-Teaching a Free Comic Book MOOC, and You Can Enroll for Free | Open Culture
The Future of MOOCs | Ellyssa Kroski | OEDB.org
Great MOOCs resource which includes links for:
- History of MOOCs
- Major MOOC Providers
- MOOC Aggregators
- MOOCs and Libraries
- The Future of MOOCs
Google Wants To Power The Online Learning Revolution With MOOC.org | Fast Company
EdX, the not-for-profit online learning initiative founded by Harvard and MIT, today announced a partnership with Google to jointly develop their open-source learning platform, known as Open EdX. The core edX offerings currently consist of a few dozen free “Massive Open Online Courses,” or MOOCs, from top-flight university partners like MIT, Harvard, and Berkeley–but the Open EdX vision goes far beyond that.
Google and edX will build out and operate MOOC.org, which will come online early next year. The site aims to be to online courses more or less what WordPress is to publishing: A free, open-source way for universities, institutions, businesses, and individuals to build and host courses in the cloud on any topic and in any format for a global audience.
Related:
MOOCing up Librarianship | Hack Library School
Insightful review of a MOOC experience from an MLIS graduate student.
During my final month of library school I decided to add one more item to my to do list: take the New Librarianship MOOC. The massive open online course MOOC was offered by Syracuse University’s School of Information Studies for graduate or continuing education credit, or just for fun. MOOCs can be a great way to supplement your library school education, so I enrolled just for fun as a final library school experience. See the full post: MOOCing up Librarianship | Hack Library School.
Coursera under fire in MOOCs licensing row | The Conversation
A prominent member of the open education movement, former Open University Vice-Chancellor Sir John Daniel, has criticised online education provider Coursera for not making its materials available under creative commons licensing.
Coursera is one of the largest providers of MOOCs – Massive Open Online Courses – which allow students to take university courses for free online from anywhere in the world.
Quotable
“While MOOCs have open enrolment, many of the MOOCs offered through commercial partners do not have open licences,” he said.
“It would be a pity if MOOCs were to act as a brake on the open education movement.”
via Coursera under fire in MOOCs licensing row | The Conversation.
See also: Coursera partners with 10 universities for online classes | CNET
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