Sites For Free Online Education

Best of all, many high quality sites are completely free. From history to coding, excellent free education awaits on the following 25 sites.

 1. Coursera

Coursera.org is a website that partners with universities and organizations around the world. This brings a wide variety of topics and perspectives to one searchable database. Coursera is a powerful tool for free online education, and includes courses from many top universities, museums and trusts. This gives the site an extremely wide range of in-depth courses. Coursera is extremely useful if you’re looking to study many different topics, or want courses from different schools and groups.

2. Khan Academy

Partnering with many post secondary schools, Khan Academy offers a useable, well organized interface. Also curating many courses from around the web, Khan Academy offers impressive depth on many different subjects. Among the more well known educational sites, Khan Academy is also incredibly useable, which may make it easier to keep learning goals.

3. Open Culture Online Courses

If you are struggling to find exactly the material you are looking for, try Open Culture’s listing of free online education courses. The page highlights 1000 lectures, videos and podcasts from universities around the world. The site features a lot of material found only on universities private sites, all in easy to browse categories. This means you can find hundreds of university courses, without having to visit and search each university’s own site. Open Culture’s list features courses from England, Australia, Wales and many state universities around the United States. A very helpful resource for finding many courses in one area of study.

4. Udemy 

Udemy’s free courses are similar in concept to Coursera’s but additionally allows users to build custom courses from lessons. Working with many top professors and schools, the site mixes the customizable platform of other sites with a heavy emphasis on top quality content. This is another site however, that mixes free and paid content.

5. Academic Earth

Another site with courses from many different schools is Academic  Earth. Much like the three sites above, Academic Earth brings together top notch courses from many different sources, and focuses on offering a wide variety of subjects. Academic Earth lists courses by subject and school, so it might be easier to find what you’re looking for.

6. edX

Another great option for free online education is edX. Also bringing together courses from many different schools, the site has impressive, quality information for everyone. edX covers a great range of topics.

7. Alison

Unlike the previous sites on this lists, Alison is a free education site offering certification in some areas. Alison offers courses mainly in business, technology, and health, but also includes language learning courses. A great option if users need certification for their learning, Alison also offers school curriculum courses.

8. iTunesU Free Courses

A very convenient place for free online education is iTunesU, because it integrates seamlessly with your iPod, or any app-ready Apple mobile device. On iPad, iPhone, or iPod touch, users download the iTunesU app. Desktop users can access  iTunesU on the upper right hand corner of the iTunes Store. iTunesU is also convenient because the store is categorized much like iTunes. Users can search learning materials in many different ways, including genre and topic. However, courses are often a mix of free podcasts or videos, and paid content. ITunesU does include courses on a pretty wide scope of topics, but does not integrate with Android, Google or Windows mobile devices.

9. Stanford Online

Your hub for all the online offerings from Stanford University, Stanford Online offers self-paced and session based courses. While Coursera features some courses from Stanford, many classes are only available via other hosts. Some courses require iTunes, but most are completed in your web browser. Stanford Online is a great site for high quality courses, though the topics are somewhat limited compared to sites partnered with more than one school.

10. Harvard Extension

Like Stanford Online, Harvard Extension features free online education courses from Harvard only. This is another excellent source for top notch course material, though the course variety is less rich than multi-school sites. Additionally, Harvard Extension allows you to search for courses by professional certificate. This makes it much easier if your online education goal includes certification.

11. Open Yale Courses

Open Yale Courses echoes Harvard Extension and Stanford Online, in that it offers only courses from Yale. While the site is similarly limited to topics taught at the school, Open Yale Courses offers a lot of videos of actual campus lectures. The availability of videos makes the site a great option if you’re looking for quality courses, but learn better by watching than by reading.

12. UC Berkeley Class Central

Much like the other schools on this list, UC Berkeley has a variety of free online education options. The school has slightly fewer courses than the schools above, but includes some supplementary lectures, webcasts and RSS Feeds, making it easy to keep up with the topics you choose.

13. MIT OpenCourseWare

Similarly, MIT offers a variety of free courses. The school has a comparable number of courses to the schools above, plus includes very in-depth course materials on the subjects available. MIT also offers free RSS feeds, a convenient way to continue learning.

14. Carnegie Mellon Open Learning Initiative

Carnegie Mellon’s free online education site is comparable with the other school’s on this list, however, Open Learning Initiative also covers a smaller range of topics. But for the topics that are covered impressive, in-depth material is available.

15. Codecademy

Codecademy is a website dedicated specifically to teaching coding.  Where other coding sites follow an example/practice session workflow, Codecademy includes a live practice window. This means you can practice coding while still viewing the lesson material. The courses at Codecademy are well written and easy to follow and the website is organized very nicely. Codecademy features a centralized dashboard where you can monitor your progress, plus organizes lessons into complete modules. This lets you learn an entire language without needing to pick the next course manually.

16. Code

Code is another website focused on coding and app writing. A site with high quality courses, Code also features learning options for kids. In addition to kid friendly courses, Code offers free online education classes on a wide variety of technology topics. These classes include app writing, robotics and Javascript. Most of the courses are also geared in a such a way that they can be useful in a classroom setting. This makes Code a great resource for harder to find coding topics, as well as various learning settings.

17. University of London Podcasts

The podcast page on the University of London website is another great source for free education. While the courses are limited to podcasts, the site features podcasts from it’s own campus, as well as eleven universities in and around London. This gives learners a wide base of topics and lectures, but still ensures in-depth material.

18. University of Oxford Podcasts

Similar to the University of London, the University of Oxford features many different podcasts. Most are public lecture series or lectures from visiting professors, with several different recordings available. The advantage to this particular site is that podcasts are organized into series, making it easy to subscribe to multiple lectures on one topic. Another good site for thoroughly in-depth lectures.

19. BBC Podcasts

For the more casual learner, the BBC offers a wide variety of podcasts on many different topics. Most podcasts are updated weekly, and focus on everything from finance, to sports, to current events. Through the World Service line of podcasts, there are also many in different languages. The focus of these podcasts are less in-depth and theory based, which may be more accessible to the average person.

20. TED-Ed

Another great destination for more general learning is TED-Ed. From the same people that brought you the all encompassing, motivational web series, comes a site chocked full of educational videos. Most include impressive animation, and all are ten minutes long or less. Not only is TED-Ed an excellent site for the curious, it also includes supplemental materials and quizzes on the videos. This makes the site extremely useful in formal education settings, as well as in entertaining ways to brush up on new discoveries and topics.

21. LessonPaths

LessonPaths is another great tool for those looking for a more usable and convenient way to access learning material. On this site, users create link playlists of their favorite learning materials from other sites. Users then rank these collections, making it easy to find many different high quality, accessible sources on a given topic.

22. Memrise

Another impressive free online education site offering ease of use and convenience is Memrise. Available both on desktop and as an app, Memrise is a particularly powerful tool if you are studying a language. The site encompasses many other topics as well, though some of the course material is user generated content. Part of what makes Memrise speacial is their integration of games into the learning materials, mixing learning with entertainment.

23. National Geographic Kids

The kids site for National Geographic is another site that makes free online education applicable for younger users. For those looking for kid friendly education, a large variety of games, puzzles, videos and photos keeps kids interested on this site. National Geographic Kids doesn’t organize learning into courses, making materials available by topic and medium instead. This makes National Geographic Kids a good option for those looking for a more casual learning environment.

24. Fun Brain

Fun Brain is another good option for kids who want to learn online, but focuses on games and fun puzzles. Particularly focused on math and reading, Fun Brain’s game based approach can be valuable if the child in question struggles to pay attention. Fun Brain offers rewards and challenges as well, and is another site aimed at a casual learning experience for kids K-8.

25. Whyville

Similar to the sites for kids free online education is Whyville a destination for preteen online learning. The site includes a variety of social features, with a focus on learning materials geared for young teens. Whyville also mixes in educational games, to make the site a well rounded option for kids too old for simple games, but too young for heavy reading based material.

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HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY 2016

On 15 August, India celebrating its 70th Independence Day.

{WISH YOU ALL } 

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY

MAY OUR COUNTRY PROGRESS IN EVERYWHERE AND IN EVERYTHING

SO THAT THE WHOLE WORLD SHOULD HAVE PROUD ON US.

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY

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Tips for Responsive Website Design

Responsive design has become the new web standard. Many companies have accepted the challenge and have created specific design solutions (such as mobile only) or have attempted to address the issue cross-platform. In this article we look at several tips to help with your design process and make it more efficient.  

One such program is Adobe Edge Reflow, which allows you to make use of media queries, set breakpoints within the program and design your layouts to fit desktop, tablet and mobile. You can then copy the CSS into another program such as Adobe Dreamweaver or other HTML editor to further refine your design.

Consider a Mobile First Strategy: This is where you build the mobile site first, then scale up and build the tablet and desktop designs. One of the major concerns for all three is the logo and/or text. If the text is easy to read on the mobile device then you shouldn’t  have any issues with the tablet or desktop.

  

Beware of Navigation: If your site has only 2-3 navigational menus, you could include those in a simple menu on the screen. If there are more menu elements, you might want to consider creating a single icon that opens into a drop down menu of additional menu items.

other option is to make use of an icon menu style as one would see with a GoMobi site.

Build the Look and Feel of Your Site(s) First: Some companies, like Jiffy Software, build the entire layout of the interface first, before doing any coding. This ensures they have the look and feel the client wants before they do any coding. When building a layout for a mobile site, one very important consideration is making the buttons large enough for a fingertip. Another consideration is keeping the design both simple, yet functional. Many designers tend to add too much to a mobile interface, which can cause design and usability problems. When in doubt, keep it simple.  

  

Be Prepared to Use Many Software Programs: For many users, using a template with WordPress will be enough but if you want to build a complex design, you might have to use custom programs and you might have to code each site individually.

As an example, if your layout is fairly straightforward you might use a template such as Moboom but for a more complex layout you might need to use programs such as Adobe Dreamweaver for the desktop and a standalone program such as GoMobi for the mobile layout. 

Images: When building responsive design layouts, create optimized images for each layout. This reduces scaling and bandwidth issues. Make use of JPEG, GIF and PNG-8 file formats. Never use PNG because it can bloat your files sizes by 5-10 times.

Use Exact Measurements with Images: (i.e. 500x350px at 100ppi) and set image dimensions to match. This will eliminate scaling and will also preserve the resolution and quality of your images. If your images scale this could cause color depth and resolution problems.

 Must Read: Quick Tips to Improve Your Web Design Skills

Use Parallax Scrolling: Here is a tutorial on how to make your site responsive. As with many design elements, the effect can be overdone, so here are some examples of several sites which use the technique well. 

About Updates: If your site is to be a one-off production then updates won’t be an issue but if you plan to build the site then hand it off to others for updates, make sure that it’s easy to do so. Include instructions for those who come after you. Make sure you place comments in the code along with written documentation so those who come after you can see what you’ve done. This will make it easier for them to make updates/changes as necessary. 

Limit the Use of Text on Mobile Devices: Only use what’s necessary, rather than trying to reproduce your desktop site on mobile device. The latter tends to create long scrolling pages, which can cause you to lose viewers.

  

Take Advantage of Google Design Standards: On this page, you will learn what Google recommends when designing sites for use with smartphones. Among other things, you’ll find out what you need to do to make your smartphone pages load quickly.

Test Code Snippets and Templates: As in some of our earlier articles on the use of API’s, be careful. You might accidentally slow down the performance of your site. If in doubt, test the components, first.

Build a toolkit of Frameworks: One fast way of creating responsive designs is to build on what is already there, using existing themes (such as Genesis or Thesis) and use these to create custom child themes. This will save an enormous amount of time since you won’t have to build a new layout from scratch. 

Clean Design: This is especially important with responsive design. Make sure you strip away all non-essentials when designing your site(s). This will improve page loading time.

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Quick Tips to Improve Your Web Design Skills

Every web designer has a secret or two. Hard-won workflows, hidden hacks, and insider knowledge that are the mark of true experience and the stuff that separates great web design training from good.

Here, we've managed to persuade some of the web's busiest devs and designers to part with their most closely guarded tricks and tips. It's quite a collection.

Packed with professional know-how, you'll discover secret features of well known tools, the beta services that the design industry is buzzing about and CSS tricks that make page design for multiple platforms easy. So whether you're a beginner at online design or a web veteran, you're bound to uncover one or two tips here that will change the way you work.

Design in shades of gray, then add color

If your web designer creates wireframes prior to visual designs, then you know the value of starting with shades of gray.  Turn your wireframe into a grayscale visual design, add your photography, then carefully add color to design elements one at a time.  

This will prevent an “overdesigned” website and help to place prominence on just the items that need it.

Use Keynote (Mac) to create rapid page prototypes

You don’t need Photoshop to create rapid prototypes of web pages, landing pages, call to actions or other web interface elements.  There’s an entire underground movement around using Keynote (that’s Apple’s version of PowerPoint) to create mockups.

There’s even an online repository containing user interface design templates for wireframing, prototyping and testing mobile and web apps in Keynote.

Add web fonts to your corporate style guide

It’s 2015, and if your corporate style guide doesn’t include web fonts, then you need to look into adding those so your website has the same governance that corporate documents and collateral does.

If you haven’t looked into this yet, Google Fonts is a great place to start. Find a suitable web font and define usage in your corporate style guide so you use it consistently online

Remove sidebars

The sidebar has been an especially popular web design trend for the last ten years, especially on blogs. Many companies are finding that when they remove sidebars from their blogs, it encourages reader attention to the article and the call to action at the end.

Removing the sidebar on our company blog has increased the number of clicks on call to action graphics over 35%.

Get color inspiration from nature

Struggling to find the perfect color combination for your website or a call to action graphic? Get your inspiration from nature. You can either use your own camera to photograph natural wonders around you or find landscape photos on the web, the use a color picker to select a color. Nature’s color palette never fails.

Step away from the computer

Good design starts with great planning. Getting your ideas down on paper or on a whiteboard can help you iterate through a design, refining it and adding detail as you go along. Drawing on a whiteboard can also make the design process collaborative and allow other team members to give input.

It’s also easy to erase pencil from paper or marker from a whiteboard and make quick changes, and once you have something concrete to work with, snap a photo with your mobile phone and get to work on screen.

Use Pinterest to create mood boards

When you’re putting together inspiration and ideas for a new website, or you’re redesigning part of your website, you need a way to collect your inspiration in one place for future reference.

Did you know that you can use Pinterest to create a mood board of your favorite images, colors, layouts, patterns, sample websites and concept material? Another great advantage of using Pinterest is that other designers create and share mood boards too, and they’ve already curated a ton of resources that you can use.

Bury those social media icons

You did all that work to get people to your website, and yet you’re inviting them to leave? That’s what you’re doing when you place social media icons in a prominent location of your website, like in the header. Bury the icons in the footer.

If people are on your website, you want them to stay, learn and perhaps inquire about your services, not check out company picnic photos and bowling outings on Facebook. Social media should send people to your website, not vice versa.

Ditch the slideshow/carousel

When the homepage slideshow/image carousel came into fashion, it was a way to get lots of information on the first page of your website. The problem is that most people don’t stay on the page long enough to experience all of the tiles/messages.  

What’s more is that the messages and images usually aren’t relevant to your prospect’s first visit. What’s the one thing a visitor should take away from their website visit? Promote that one thing -- usually what your company does in layman’s terms -- and ditch the rest.

Simplify navigation

Reducing your visitors’ options might seem counter intuitive, but it can actually help guide people to your most productive content. Rather than overwhelming your website visitors with links to every page, simplify your navigation.

Eliminate dropdown menus and especially multi-tier dropdown navigation that only the most skilled mouse user can navigate, and go a step further by reducing the number of links in the header or sidebar of your website.

Increase your font size

Typography is incredibly important in web design. Text is hard enough to read on a computer screen, so you have to make the important things stand out.

One way to do this is to increase your font sizes, especially for headings and important blocks of text. Consider increasing the size of your normal font, too.

Use white space

It may be hard to believe that using whitespace is a hack, but I evaluate websites every day that could use more whitespace. Not every blank area of the screen needs to be filled.

Even though whitespace and simplicity are in style right now, too many companies try to cram everything into a small space, or worse yet, “above the fold.”  Give your design room to breathe, and your website visitors will be able to find things easier.

Use the squint test

Want a quick way to learn what’s most prominent on your website? Back away from your computer screen and squint.  Most everything will become blurry, and only the larger, colorful, more prominent features will be noticeable.

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