Believe it or not, there are universities that have websites available with free course materials on them. That means if you are short on funds at the moment you can still learn! You do have to remember that you will not be able to receive credits for these courses so the learning will be for your personal benefit only. You will have to do some work to convince others that the learning deserves to be a consideration in your request for a pay raise, a job you are applying for, or an application to further education. However, it can increase your confidence and knowledge in a subject and it can help you determine if you are ready to enroll for programs at schools that do grant degrees, diplomas and certificates.

One of the universities that offers free courses online is the U.K. Open University through their Open Learn site. I found this site online about five years ago and have dabbled in their offerings on and off since then. I don't work for them or have any contact with them other than using the website myself as a learner. They offer 12 different topics for study as follows:

Arts and History
Business and Management
Education
Health and Lifestyle
IT and Computing
Law
Mathematics and Statistics
Modern Languages
Science and Nature
Society
Study Skills
Technology

When you choose one of those topics on their website, you are provided with a list of the units you can study in that topic. This list includes the name of the unit and the level of difficulty of the unit. This can range from beginner to advanced. It also gives the average number of hours needed to complete the unit which ranges from 1 hour on up to about 50 hours. There is a brief description of the unit and a rating given by previous users for most of the units. Clicking on one of the units gives another list and brief description of the sections of the unit and of course from there you click on a section to begin studying. In a sidebar on the left in some of the units, is the list of all the sections in the unit so you can move around to the other sections without having to go back to the page with the section descriptions which is very handy when you want to refresh your memory on something you read in a previous section or if you just want to do the sections in a different order than they have placed them. Also in the left sidebar are the links to the tools which are available to learners. There is a video conferencing tool, a tool for creating video diaries online almost immediately, knowledge maps, forums, learning clubs, and learning journals along with mini courses on how to use these tools.

Studying in Open Learn will not give you anywhere near the equivalent of a degree or even a diploma in any field. However, for beginners to a field or for brushing up on some of the basic skills, the courses that I have looked at are easy to follow and you don�t require other books to read to understand and get a good grounding in the subject. For instance if you haven�t studied for a long time and weren�t necessarily a good student even then, the study skills courses would be excellent to work on before signing up for other courses. There are no assignments to hand in so you can take your time and do the activities and the reading as you have the time. It also means you are not pressed for time if you want to go back over some of the information before moving on, even if you want to reread it several times. You can work through all the units under a topic or work on units under different topics depending on your goals and interests.

One of the main problems with the free courses from this website and others is that you have to be motivated to learn yourself and set your own timetable. You could also work through a unit without doing the activities that are suggested, which would of course, cut way back on what you actually learn from the course but you would still learn something. On the other hand most of the units give references at the end which would allow you to do extra reading on the topic if you wish. One of the drawbacks to this site is that much of the information on some topics, such as law for example, is based on either British or European information. There are a few general units in Law, such as �Making and Using Rules�, that are pertinent to any situation but you might want to check out that factor before starting on a unit. Many other units however can be used by any learner. There is even a unit under study skills about learning online along with some units on using computers while learning.

Take a look at this site. You might find something you want to learn more about without having to pay for your learning. It is a great resource available to everyone with computer access.


http://openlearn.open.ac.uk/