Free Online Study

This post is about a new information revolution touching education.

This revolution gently started in October 2011 when the two most famous teachers in AI start an online course program. To a huge surprise more than 160’000 students register for this course. There were children, lone mother, PHD… People from all around the world follow the lesson. I know that because I was one of them. This was an incredible experience, and so many views and ideas were shared in nice and productive environment.

After the success of this course an incredible thing happened: Many university teachers from different places begin to propose similar course in fields such as physics, business, humanities, statistics…

And I am not talking a about slide and exercise put online but real course with lecture taught by world-class professors who work universities like MIT, Stanford, Princeton, Berkeley and so on.

Courses are interactive videos but this is not all there are also; exercises, active global community, exams, slides, quizzes etc. By a voting system, teachers answer to student’s top questions.

Every course is free and for everyone.

Here is some websites you find this kind of course.

Coursera
Academic Earth
Udacity
Khan Academy

And for the one who are interested with an MIT education for $2’000:

For  high school (secondary school) student

 

Getting ready – Back to School syndrome!!

After the last few posts at the end of June (i.e. Completed – 30 Days on How to love yourself more, my plan on the weekly challenge How you love yourself in the next 90 days? (2012.W27)) and Enjoy right now being who you want to be ~ in early July, we have been travelling ever since (to Berlin for a weekend, to Scotland for a 10 days vacation, Istanbul this week)…

The plan was to prepare for the coming 30 Days on How to Love Your Partner (effectively 1st August 2012 – WATCH THE SPACE COMING!!), write and share more posts while during our travel… Well, plan always gets rescheduled and revised after unforeseen changes. Despite the change of plan, we have been enjoying the trip and each other’s accompany very much. (And ‘checked’ few more of our bucket list challenges!)

Photo from “Back to School Syndrome” By Woman’s Day

Now I have been back to work for a week and soon we will resume our bucket challenge post writing. I found the “Back to School Syndrome” has hit us, especially me. It’s not so much about acquiring the new goodies, but the parts that lack of energy, trying to shift the habits and routines from holiday mode to working mode, lots to do on the plate but need to settle down, refocus and prioritize properly on the job. I felt like to redefine my purpose and goals for a new beginning in the midst of all the events continue happening without me being ready, nor so much being in control. I felt left behind…

To children after vacation and back to school, it may be an adjustment of environments (home vs. school) or a shift adaptation in living routine (from a more free, less strict time schedule during holiday to regular schooling habits). It is believed children would soon pass through the phases and ready for school life again. While digging in a bit more on this long gone, but re-appeared “Back to school” feeling I have and re-examining this special relationship, I have found the psychological impact (at least for me when I was a child and guess there is till now): is that I felt everything starts again (set to zero), I need to set my goals, being in control, so I may perform and achieve and I am under the pressure of my own expectations. As at the beginning of back to school, I am still in the process of refinding myself and grasping the new; I become anxious due to not being in control, I become lost and energy less soon after grasping all directions for nothing. These phases and emotions all happened just in one go (within a split second). I am just at the end of the split second. I am totally surprised at my own findings!! (How my past experiences + emotion memory = resulted action just all copied and pasted over to the current situation!)  

I feel much better now as I slowly resuming my goals at work and with the posts writing (sometimes, something just cannot be rushed). I also love myself more (since it has become a very important subject) by changing my wordings and attitudes towards this high standard of expectation, from “I need to/should perform well” to “I want to perform well” without imposed pressure. It’s a simple change, but it changes the whole perspective for me.