Free Online Courses

Course / Program Name: Speak For Success

Hosted by / Sponsored by: About.com

Course of Study: Communication skills

Course Link: http://sbinfocanada.about.com/c/ec/32.htm

The ability to communicate well is essential to a having a successful business.

For instance, effective communication is needed for sales because if you cannot clearly relay messages to your customers, you might just lose them.

Manager also need to know who to communicate well.  If a manager does not communicate well with the management team or the folks they manage, misunderstandings can arise and adversely affect productivity.

Furthermore, a business cannot market itself correctly without also communicating. The best laid marketing campaign plans will falter if your business does not get the correct message to its potential clients. Or worse still, if it sends a completely incorrect message.

One of the very basic communication tools is the ability to speak effectively.

Are you someone that thinks about the impression you leave when you speak, and are somebody that never wants to irritate others during in-person encounters? If yes, this course was designed with you in mind.

This course contains six speaking lessons, as well as a capping lesson that assists you in shaping oral communication abilities. Every lesson targets one particular speaking skill, where you will also get informed about an associated poor speech issue. To counter each poor speech issue, you will be provided with exercises to eliminate unhealthy speaking habits.

These lessons will enable you to sound more smooth and skilled. And this ability to communicate effectively will lead to a more successful business.

Here are a few things you’ll need to know from the get-go:

• Carefully put in your email address. If you don’t take this care, your email will get bounced.
• You’ll need to turn off any anti-spam blockers, or include sbinfocanada.guide@about.com in your list of “approved” emails.
• For those that may want to move ahead, you can simply click on the  “Missed Lessons” link at each lesson’s bottom, and then choose the lesson(s) you’d like mailed right away.

This course spans  seven weeks. You will get lesson one the moment you register. A brand new lesson will arrive each week.

Course / Program Name: The Italian Electronic Classroom

Hosted by / Sponsored by: Centro Studi Italiani

Course of Study: Italian

Course Link: Take this course

Description: Explore one of the most popular and beautiful languages through a new website aimed at making Italian easy to learn. The Italian Electronic Classroom is designed so you can expand your knowledge of the language as the website continues to grow.  Learn about Rome, famous painters, opera singers, and wine. Or, try challenging games and crossword puzzles. You can even get a Pen Pal (remember those?) and converse in Italian.

Since the website is really a work in progress, you’ll have the opportunity to refresh your knowledge often, learn more and even offer suggestions for improvements as the website is continuously updated. Check back every now and then and test yourself to see what and how much of the Italian language you’ve really learned. Take a look at the link to the City College of San Francisco for more opportunities to register for online Italian courses taught by Professor Georgio Spano.

Course / Program Name: Writing And Reading The Essay

Hosted by / Sponsored by: MIT

Course of Study: Writing / Literature

Course Link: Take This Course

Description: Provided by MIT, this free online writing course is all about the history of the essay and why it is important to know how to both read and write an essay properly before you can create one correctly yourself. Provided largely for those who are interested in the history of the essay, learners can gain a greater knowledge about the essay’s past through a mixture of writing and reading during this course.

Initially released in the Fall of 2005, this course, which is at the undergraduate level, was delivered by Prof. Rebecca Blevins Faery and was originally carried out over a period of 25 lectures, each lasting 1.5 hours each. Whilst it will be possible to carry out certain sections quicker than this if so preferred, all of the necessary materials are provided should you wish to work to the full 37.5 hours.

Course/Program Name: Introduction to Visual Thinking

Hosted by/ Sponsored by: Webcast Berkeley Courses

Course of Study: Practice of Art

Course Link: Take this course

Description: Explore what it means to think visually, with Berkeley University web and audio lectures. The course illustrates how in art what you see is not necessarily what you get. You learn to contemplate art with all the senses—to become sensitive to what is beyond what seems obvious. Through every type of medium and style you are challenged to question continually and expand your ideas of what constitutes art and reality, regardless of taste.

The passion in the process of art is where the artist finds points of reference and investigation. From minimalism to collage and classic to modern, you will learn to seek in the content of art deeper histories, narratives and contexts. You will appreciate how perceptions of the moment of art-making are always changing through time.

Course / Program Name: 10 Days to a Happier, Successful Career and Life

Hosted by / Sponsored by: About.com

Course of Study: Balancing responsibilities

Course Link: http://humanresources.about.com/c/ec/59.htm

The key to a happy home life and work life is balance. And with this 10 Days to a Happier, successful Career and Life, you’ll receive training on employing the necessary balance in your life.

Life is always throwing challenges at you. Maybe you’re putting students through college, trying to fix up an old house, while all the while trying to save for retirement. Furthermore, you’d love spend quality time with your family.

With such issues in mind, this course focuses on the ten most necessary concepts that can give you the tools to succeed in your work — in spite of it all. However, you’ll also learn how to succeed at work without failing at home.

Everybody wants to be successful and happy, and this course will show you that you do not need to give up one for the other. This is a ten lesson series, where you’ll grow while you read. Most importantly you’ll take the necessary time to stop and think deeply about your life.

There are two ways to take this class. The first involves subscribing to the email newsletter.  O, if you like, you can use this website as the launch pad: http://humanresources.about.com/c/ec/59.htm

Course / Program Name: A Touch of Russian

Hosted by / Sponsored by: BBC

Course of Study: Russian

Course Link: Take this course

Description: In this course offered by BBC Languages, you get to learn the Russian language in a fun and creative way. The course follows fictional characters, Chris, from London, and Irina, from Moscow, as they fall in love in the heart of Russia. While you try to guess the meaning of the word or sentence to follow the drama of their lives, you’ll learn the language as you watch a Russian love story unfold.

After the experience of the soap opera, take some time to read some facts, learn the alphabet or listen to mp3 clips of Russian words and phrases. If you’re really brave, go a few steps further and try reading the BBC Russian news website.

Course / Program Name: Approaching Poetry

Hosted by / Sponsored by: The Open University

Course of Study: Writing / Literature

Course Link: Take This Course

Description: This free online course from The Open University is aimed at those who already have a good grasp of poetry writing and consider themselves to be at an intermediate level.  It is expected to take approximately 20 hours to complete.

Consisting of 10 sections that follow a lengthy and in-depth introduction, each of the 10 sections covers a topic related to the understanding of poetry and what most poets would consider to be necessary knowledge items, such as rhythm and poetic inversion.

Although the course may be aimed at those who already have an understanding of poetry, it covers a topic that a lot of beginner poets find intriguing – poems that don’t rhyme – meaning that some parts of the course may be of use to those new to poetry writing.

Course / Program Name: Napoleonic Paintings

Hosted by / Sponsored by: The Open University

Course of Study: Arts and History

Course Link: Take this Course

Description: “Napoleonic Paintings” examines how Napoleon’s regime compromised and censored to control mass propaganda in the prestigious “history painting” patronized by diverse crowds at the Salon of the Louvre.

Through lectures, exercises and plates, the 16 hour course explores the challenges of framing Napoleon’s public image as a peace seeking, moral and civilizing military genius who felt for the common man.

Napoleon’s paintings circulated in a post Revolutionary period that questioned divine right and authority—during a shift away from Enlightenment ideals of the rational, heroic and traditional and toward more Romantic sensibilities of the irrational, individual and modern questioning of suffering and violence.

Two paintings are singled out as pivotal in emulating the emerging Romantic style and for revealing the tensions between the “civilizing mission” of enlightened nationalistic ideals and the reality of suffering and death. The paintings “Jaffa” and “Eylau” by Jean Antoine Gros ‘are said to enshrine not only Napoleon’s heroism but also Gros’s misgivings’—introducing doubt into the glory of French history painting.

A short section of the course is devoted to Women and Portraiture in Napoleonic Europe, showing unprecedented privacy and authority in public images of women.

Course / Program Name: First Year Chinese I

Hosted by / Sponsored by: Utah State University

Course of Study: Chinese

Course Link: Take this course

Description: This course from Utah State University offers an appreciation and understanding of how to speak and write the Chinese language. Taught by professor, Li Li, Ph.D, the main concentration of the course is on pronunciation and Chinese character writing. Begin with reading and writing in Lessons 1 through 7 and then follow up with practice exercises and the language lab and you should be well on your way to speaking Chinese.

Lessons are approximately one hour long, which you will take four times a week until completion. The course includes video lectures and supplementary materials online. Technical requirements include Windows Media Player, QuickTime Player and Adobe Reader.

Texts

Beijing Language Institute, (1993). Practical Chinese Reader Elementary Course: Book I. Boston: Cheng & Tsui Company

Chu, M. M. (1992). Practical Chinese Reader I: Patterns & Exercises. Boston: Massachusetts, Cheng & Tsui Company

Teng, S. H. (1993). Practical Chinese Reader I & II: Writing Workbook. Boston: Massachusetts, Cheng & Tsui Company

Course / Program Name: Psychology 140

Hosted by / Sponsored by: Webcast Berkeley Courses

Course of Study: Developmental Psychology

Course Link: Take this course

Description: The Berkeley introductory course explores the social, political and philosophical implications of understanding childhood development. Physical and emotional aspects of prenatal through childhood and adolescent development are discussed. A neuroscientist discusses brain development and plasticity in relation to the mind. Other topics include language acquisition, cognitive development and biocultural relationships.

The prolonged stages of early human growth are viewed as a paradox and evolutionary necessity. Other developmental issues to consider are perceptions around imagination and reality, decision-making and morality.

The lectures are presented in webcast  and podcast format.