A few days ago, my boyfriend introduced me to this amazing thing called edX courses. Probably you’ve already heard about this and if not, we can share the shame of ignoring its existence.
In this post, I’m going to show you how to take advantage of free online courses, such as edX, either for reforcing your studying, making it a habit or just for the pure joy of learning. My case is the third since I haven’t been able to find courses related to my field.
About edX (particularly)
Basically edX is an entity that contains tons of online free courses provided by amazing universities. About basically anything. (basically)
This a screenshot of the general topics that edX, in different languages:
The best of edX
So many topics to learn about. It doesn’t matter if your field is medicine, you can still go and learn some badass architecture.
Every course is free (hooray for all my poor fellas that understand me)
You can pay if you want to: Check the courses that are currently going on and you can pay either 25$ or 50$ depending on the course. The thing about this is that you get a certificate of the course you’ve taken and the university that provided the course. (you can happily show a Harvard course in your CV)
Even if a course has ended or closed, you can still pass it.
edX provides you the info of the course before taking it so you can organise yourself
There are guides. if you feel lost, you can ask people that are constantly participating for help or even the professor that made the course.
There are tests that help identify your comprehension or what still needs reinforcement
This all depends on you, this is pure passion
I mean look at this. These are just a few of the unis that provide courses to edX.
How do I take advantage of an awesome page I found with free online courses?
Choose wisely
Probably the hardest thing. I got so excited searching through all the courses that I found so many I had to take.
What do you need to priorise:
What subject do I need to reinforce ?
Do I suck at something ?
Do I love especially something ? Something that could potentially help me to find my passions ?
Once you’ve realised what you need, it’s time to organise.
Make a calendar: The simplest and first step for organisation.
Get to know your schedule well: be able to know how much time you can dedicate to this extra thing.
Identify the days in which you usually have more time to take advantage of instead of binge watching videos on Youtube on how snails have sex.
Identify the days that you feel way too tired or heavy days to not count on them. Because damn, we all need breaks.
Count the hours you can dedicate on it and compare it to the website. If it’s the same or similar, super. If it’s not there’s 2 options: 1) you ended up with extra time to indeed watch snails have sex or 2) you lack time which is something harder to handle but not impossible. My solution is, believe it or not, trying out the first plan. If it truly doesn’t work then you can decide how to dedicate extra time on it depending on itr priority.
This all generic, in all honesty, but the good thing about this website is that it does help you organise yourself because it tells you the amount of time you need per day to achieve the course in the ideal time. (I obviously suck at organising tips)
Example of a course I’m taking
Isn’t this beautiful ? Well it is.
We tend to forget that we study for passion. We’re not supposed to feel like all we do is mechanic and to please other people’s expectations (our parents, our friends, our teachers, everyone). Learning is great. Being forced to understand something that we don’t catch and get humilliated by a number that condens our understanding is the bastardisation of education.
Let’s all bloody avoid it.
That’s the moral or the story.
Lack of information is no excuse. Look in the endless possibilities that Internet gives you to expand your mind.
edX website
