Coursera, Edx and Futurelearn are some of those sites, which I really trust. Their courses are indeed academic and are supported by various reputed universities across the world.
However, not everyone is able to afford the courses offered by them. Talking about India, learning on these platforms can cost a fortune.
So, today, I’m sharing some ways in which you can make the most out of your online learning. I don’t have any experience of Edx yet. In this article, I’m sharing tactics for Coursera and Futurelearn only.
1. Determine if you want certificate
It’s not necessary that you would like to have a certificate.
Since auditing is free, i.e, accessing the course contents is free on these platforms, you can update your knowledge, in case you don’t want any certificate.
2. Free Digital Upgrade
This tactic is exclusively for Futurelearn. You must look for the category ‘Free Digital Upgrade’. Under this category, all the courses are free along with their certificates.
3. Reach out to your college or employer
This tactic is exclusively for Coursera. Coursera provides certain packages specific for businesses and colleges so that they could purchase many courses in bulk and give the subscription access to their employees and students respectively.
You can also request your college or employer to subscribe if they can afford to.
4. Download the resources
Within the curriculum, many courses share additional resources, which you can extensively make use of. I’ve seen many courses sharing many ebooks and research papers for free.
You should also save those resources. In this way, you would be deriving the additional real value of the course.
5. Use Forums
In Coursera, You can use forums to your advantage. At a moment, there are dozens of people pursuing a course. You can get to interact a lot of people from different parts of the world.
If you share your blog over there, not only would you get a strong backlink, you can also drive a big audience to your platform.
You can share your assignments over there to get reviews faster.
If you’ve got any query with what is being taught, you can clarify it there itself.
In Futurelearn, you’ll have to comment your views, there’re no such forums.
6. Connect with colleagues and instructors
Connecting with colleagues and instructors is a good option because they would be of your domain. You can easily get to know what they’re up to.
Linked in is the best option for this.
While sending connection requests, you can add a note, telling them, that what you found peculiar in their course. This also motivates them.
You can also give them recommendations.
7. Add those certificates to your profile
Adding your certificates to your LinkedIn profile would show your expertise in those subjects.
8. Read assignments of peers
A good thing I like about some of the courses on Coursera is the implication of peer graded assignments. This develops your reviewing skills. You can also find inspiration in such way.