DISQUS

Walter · 7 months ago

I listen to lectures while walking to work, riding the bus, or sometimes while at work.

I tend towards lectures on economics, psychology, philosophy, and the social science of the internet.

The goal is just personal enrichment.

In addition to the great selection of open courseware, I'm a big bloggingheads.tv fan.

Cliff · 7 months ago

I listed to lectures on the drive to/from work.

I do it only for personal enrichment.

I usually go for history courses.

Stephen Barkley · 7 months ago

I listen for personal enjoyment while running. Long runs and long lectures go hand-in-hand.

I've listened to Yale's course on the Hebrew Bible. I'm also part way through Physics for Future Presidents.

Jan Schwartz · 7 months ago

I listen to them while hiking and working in the yard-- mostly for personal enrichment now. But, when I was designing my grad program I listened to a variety of lectures for ideas for course development, papers, etc.

Topics I enjoy are economics, philosophy and education.

Dan Colman · 7 months ago

A hearty thanks for the helpful info. Keep it coming.

Bob Price · 7 months ago

Being a few years in age beyond structured curriculums of most colleges, I like to use the open university offerings to develop my personal curriculum based on knowledge areas I want to investigate. This will become the future of education once certification procedures are in place.

Mark · 7 months ago

Our home school family uses the courses as classroom material. Both of my high school age kids have "taken" "Physics for Future Presidents" and they were inspired by it.

Of course, I still have to prepare tests, and assign outside reading and writing assignments for the courses we use.

Does anyone know of any open courses that include links to tests and quiz materials to reduce my "teacher" workload?

Deepak · 7 months ago

i listen to these lectures for both personal and professional enrichment.

i listen to lectures and podcasts offline after downloading. I put all into my cowon d2 so that i may use my spare time in the day.

for sure they will add shine to my resume. i am definitely gonna write it under self learning heading of my resume ( but only the things i will actually end up learning).

about recession, these course are always a cost saver. there is nothing cheaper than free.

i consider myself a medical geek. So i am all into science ( computer science, medical science and stuff)

keep posting awesome stuff OpenCulture....

Evan Plaice · 7 months ago

I watch opencourse video whenever I can find time (busy work schedule lately).

I use it for personal, as well as professional purposes. Being a young contractor/freelancer, how much I make and how much work I can find depends directly what I'm capable of.

Lately I've been watching a lot of vids on Entrepreneurship ('cause Michael Dell and Guy Kawasaki have a lot of good stuff to share about starting/running a business), Ecomonics ('cause what you see on TV news is BS and I like to be informed). Computer Science I from Harvard (I like to go back and fill in gaps). Operating Systems from Berkley (for new material). And Physics from MIT with Walter Lewin (because I like physics too much to take a real class in school and Lewin is awesome). Lewin kinda reminds me of the Red Bull Scientist guy... that makes him almost as awesome as Einsteins foonky hairdo.

I get most of my material via Academic Earth. I only wish I could plug it into boxee and watch on tv via AppleTV or over a HTPC running windows and Boxee alpha.

I watch OpenCourseware mostly because I don't see myself going back to school to finish my degree any time soon. I severely dislike the traditional school systems (politics and all) and much prefer to produce something tangible with my efforts. The instructors at Harvard, MIT, etc... remind me of what it was like to have great instructors who are genuinely passionate about what they teach. If I had instructors like them I'd go back in an instant. Unfortunately, they don't allow online degrees to go along with this material so I'll be studying for the intrinsic satisfaction for now.

For the previous commenter. AcademicEarth has links to course materials (assignments, tests, quizzes) attached to each course where they're available.

Amar · 7 months ago

Personally I use them for both. I seek information that is relevant for the classes that i'm taking, and I just downloaded two audiobooks for personal enjoyment.

Ron Peterson · 7 months ago

I spent ten years in graduate school and finally tired of the degrees and regimen but not of the learning experience and frankly I'm thrilled by being in the classroom from the comfort of my home. My interests are eclectic so I'll follow a course in Ancient History with one on Modern Physics. I couldn't be more pleased to have stumbled upon Open Culture, and thank you.

Jon · 7 months ago

I watch open courses at night after work, or listen to them in the car during my commute. Generally, I stick with history, philosophy, and some economics, but I'd love to see schools open up their professional courses, specifically accounting. That probably won't happen anytime soon.

I don't know that I would ever put an open course on my resume.

Pete · 7 months ago

Personal development; listen on ipod in car or mowing lawn. I don't do video courses, just audio.

Jen · 7 months ago

Personal enrichment, all range of topics. Love your site.

Carol A · 7 months ago

I listen in the bus or plug MP3 into car. Courses are: Ancient History (which I am also studying at university), various topics in philosophy and astronomy for my own interest, computers (for work).
It's opened up a whole new world and thanks very much to the universities who provide these courses.

Emily Keller · 7 months ago

I listen to them on long walks, and to and from work. I'm a librarian, so background on just about anything will come in handy at some point. Learning about scholars questions, approaches, methodologies, trends in scholarship...all this is important for my work. But I also enjoy listening, learning, whether it's practical or not. I feel so lucky to be living in a moment in time where there's so much more flexibility for learning through these various media!

ged · 7 months ago

during commute

DanColman · 7 months ago

Thanks all for the good responses. I actually learned a lot here.

Irene · 7 months ago

I listen to them on walks, exercising, or at work while I am working on a project that does not require a great deal of focus.

I listen for personal enrichment and to gain insight on how other people are doing their educational podcasts.

I listen to a wide range of topics.

Ana · 7 months ago

I stumbledupon OpenCulture and I've been hooked daily.

There are two RSS feeds I visit daily - BBC and OpenCulture.

I have a drive for knowledge and my interests range from so many things.

OpenCulture's posts are fascinating and caters to actually almost all of my interests: films, literature, languages, your videos are awesome too, and the open courses have all been interesting.

jun · 7 months ago

i use them for both.

I also use them so I can tell others about them, so they can use them too.

Stephen Monaghan · 7 months ago

Personal enrichment while driving. Biology,history and philosophy so far.

Ben Curtis · 7 months ago

I like to listen to lectures/readings on the way to and from work, while walking, and while waiting. I consider my listening as personal enrichment, but reflecting on it, I realize it sometimes dovetails with professional reasons. I'm pretty eclectic, but tend to look first at topics related to music, literature, linguistics, psychology, physics, and culture.

Leishalynn · 7 months ago

I've been listening to open access university courses since they started. Before that, I perused open-access syllabi & studied required books for various university courses. I focus on literature, particularly poetry, but also enjoy philosophy and some history. Why? To learn, to grow, to be reminded that, while I'm surrounded by people who actually care who wins Dancing with the Stars, there are others, many others who are intellegent, erudite, and elegant in their speech who understand that poetry, philosophy, and history are rich and rewarding pursuits.

Mark Weitzman · 7 months ago

MIT physics for teaching, Stanfor SEE for Computer Science Yale OCW for game theory

yoyo · 2 months ago

I do like to use the open courses to enrich myself everyday.Reading and learning makes me feel full.I happend to find this websit,and i like the style quite a lot .

Dyaxen · 2 months ago

I watch lectures on History, Mathematics, Anatomy, Physics, Computer Science, Literature, Foreign Language and pretty much anything else that appears interesting on a daily basis. I'll be starting college next year to major in Quantum Physics, and I use any resources I can find to try and lighten a bit of the studying pressure now. As for the seemingly unrelated courses, every bit of knowledge makes you more well rounded, and can help you view an issue from a different perspective, or open the door to a whole new career you may not have considered before.

The only thing that could make open courses better is the aforementioned college credit. As a current freelancer/entrepreneur, I myself have begun to look into the possibilities of that bright future. The cheaper it is to educate yourself, the better off the world will be. I hope within a few years this will be a viable idea to pursue. A big thank you to Openculture (which I have just discovered today, I've been using AcademicEarth as my main source) and all of the other online providers of open coursesware. :)