Introducing Massive Open Online Courses
to everyone who don’t take them ..
In early 2013, I was looking for good resources online to learn about Algorithms. In the process, I found a full-fledged 6 week online course offered by Stanford University. The course goes in-depth on the fundamentals of the subject, and it seemed to have a really interesting online format with videos, quizzes, assignments, and a community. It was free, I signed up.
Ever since I have experimented a lot with open online courses, and I have benefited greatly from them. In the past year, there has been way too much hype(and criticism) around the concept. Yet I believe there isn't enough awareness, mainly because people in my circles do not know about them and haven’t taken any of these classes. These courses are Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs).
MOOCs bring the world’s top educators to all the students around the world, through the Internet. These courses provide video lectures, course text, readings and assignments that are the same as those used for their students on their campuses.
Here is a random set of features/facts about moocs. Some of this may be exaggerated, but it is my humble opinion.
- Courses on Computational Neuroscience, Business Strategy, Design or Psychology. You name it. Wanna build Android Apps?
- They are (mostly) Free. Bells and whistles included (..and certificates too)
- They are provided by world’s best institutes (Stanford, MIT, Harvard to name a few)
- Really really passionate and learned instructors, hence better learning ( Functional Programming Principles in Scala is actually taught by the founder of the programming language Scala himself→ Martin Odersky ! It’s crazy man.)
- (Variety of) Course formats — optimized for online learning
- (Variety of) Course formats — optimized for a busy schedule (some of them are self-paced, some have a time frame)
- Bleeding edge course content
- Pause — Rewind!!
- Any topic to learn from under the sun ☺ (or master earth science )
- Flexibility to choose your own career path ( Even the Music Industry ☺ )
- Receive credit/certificate
- Add your mooc accomplishment’s to your LinkedIn profile
- Project-based learning
- Extremely innovative content delivery and course accessibility methods using modern software and technology (try the edX demo, see image below)
- Constant improvements in the mooc platforms, and a growing list of mooc providers
- 100,000+ students participate in most of the moocs (that I have taken)
- Opportunity to network with other student’s/co-learner’s from around the world on the course forums, online groups, or local meetup’s
My goal with this post is to get you interested in the courses. Having learnt nothing in my entire degree program, I believe that education is finally getting the critical system update that every learner is deeply craving for. And the current version of moocs gives a good sense of how school and education will be tomorrow.
I encourage you all to try out a course that interests you. Go to a course page, like this one, and read the description of the course. If it does interest you, have a look at the recommended background. You like it? Enroll and give it a shot. Else look around the site and find another course.
The free nature of MOOCs makes it an awesome tool to explore and find your passion or master a discipline. ! All you need is an internet-connected laptop, and you are good to go. Here is a list of some awesome mooc platforms.
PS. I am not affiliated with any of these programs. If this post was helpful to you, great!
