A few weeks ago Stuff to Watch took a decidedly academic turn with the inclusion of YouTube’s rather fantastic Education section. This portion of the site brings together higher, middle and junior level learning materials which are offered as lectures, lessons and even whole courses for the casual learner.Today we’ll be going all-out on the learning front with a few of the best video courses available on the web, courtesy of highly respectable educational institutions and Coursera. The service offers real courses that bring the online learning experience to life in a way that trumps just about every other service out there.Coursera provides an opportunity to lean for free, wherever you like, in a productive learning environment.How It WorksUnlike many online courses, which are simply a collection of videos that you can watch at your leisure, Coursera courses share more similarities with real university courses. Each course lasts for a pre-defined period of time usually measured in weeks, with most being “module” sized and spanning a month or two at most. In order to join, the courses require enrollment by a certain date.This is because Coursera brings together the vast number of people interested in the same field as you, so everyone learns at the same time. It is also because much of the time you will be marking each other’s work. It is important to note that not every course will take the video route, but the overwhelming majority do – of
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