June 19, 2008
Blog Offers Guide to Online Lecture Recordings From 'Great Universities'
A growing number of colleges and universities are recording lectures and making them available free on YouTube or the iTunes Store. But it’s hard to know where to go if you’re looking for a lecture on a particular topic, like geography or philosophy.
The Open Culture blog offers a frequently-updated listing of links to online lecture recordings, arranged by subject. More than 250 online courses are included, covering about 30 academic disciplines. The collection is called “Free Online Courses from Great Universities.”
You can get a broad education from these free course materials. Titles include “Historical Jesus,” “Frontiers and Controversies in Astrophysics,” and “Wildlife Ecology.” Many are available for download to an iPod, so there’s plenty of potentially enriching material to play during that summer road trip. —Jeffrey R. Young
Posted on Thursday June 19, 2008 | Permalink |Comments
Commenting is closed for this article.
Previous: Modern Language Association Records to Be Included on WorldCat
Next: Law Professors File Brief in Support of Piracy Defendant
This is the beginning of the end of traditional course formats, and it couldn’t come soon enough.
— Jeff McNeill Jun 19, 07:15 PM #
Hardly the end! Just another resource which needs to be used appropriately. Unless, of course, Jeff, you think of education as filling minds with data. Direct conversation, discussion face-to-face with peers is critical.
The educational enterprise is often like the proverbial ostrich toward media vehicles: we kick them around or we claim we never use them or we swallow them whole. But the ostrich does have a brain, and a smart ostrich does not limit its actions (or it quickly becomes a dead ostrich.)* We need to employ a whole panoply of media, but mediated education alone fails to provide the community interaction essential to the humanities. Currently I am developing a hybrid course (half face-to-face, half employing other indirect media) and welcome the blend.
*disclosure: I have used this imagery before in an article “The Church as Electronic Ostrich.” It fits the educational community as well.
— be! Jun 20, 12:00 AM #
Isn’t summer vacation suppose to be about enjoying time with your family and friends. It shouldn’t be with earbuds in your ears and you off in no man’s land.
But to the point, this seems like a great resource.
— Michael Jun 20, 06:25 AM #
Whoo-hoo! I can’t wait to hop in the ol’ station wagon and hit the road with the family while listening to “Frontiers and Controversies in Astrophysics.”
— Susan Jun 20, 08:44 AM #
I think the best way to think about the role of such media resources is as an alternative to a textbook. Sure, you can learn from it, but having a real, live professor can make a significant (and irreplaceable) contribution to the learning process.
— a different Dan Jun 20, 08:53 AM #
So it would seem that the title “Free Online Courses from Great Universities” is a bit of a misnomer. As this blog entry points out, what is being offered is in fact a “Guide to Online Lecture Recordings From ‘Great Universities’.” There is more to the course than simply listening to the lecture.
— Peter Murray Jun 20, 08:57 AM #
I think this is awesome!
Especially for people who cannot afford to pay for a course but like to learn as well as for people with physical disabilities who can appreciate easy access to this type of info. I think these type of alternatives learning sources are just that, alternatives. I like it! Everything is changing, people, lifestyles, culture, etc. It’s good to have various methods of education for people anywhere. An online download may not be your cup of tea (or coffee) but for some people it’s all they have.
Nickg at theolotech dot com.
— Nick G Jun 20, 11:44 AM #
“Free Online Courses from Great Universities.”? Free and great usually do not walk hand-in-hand together. More like “I AM brilliant, aren’t I—I shall post my brilliance on YouTube for all to experience.” Have you folks spent much time online at these sites? Sure, there’s a few cool things to see and hear, but it’s mostly nonsense.
No way “free online lectures from self-identified greatness” shuts down any universities. Outlandish spending by unscrupulous administrators is a MUCH bigger threat to the academy.
— Snake Jun 20, 12:06 PM #
I agree with Snake — the lectures that I have seen online (in topics I am interested in) have bored me to death! I have attended 10 different colleges/universities (great and small – it’s a long story) — the best lecturers I ever had were at the two community colleges I attended; the worst one was at one of the great universities.
— Alan Jun 20, 06:31 PM #
The Yale courses are excellent – not only were the courses recorded, but the full transcripts are available. The whole course may be downloaded as a zip file (text files only). Only a few classes right now – but presumably more to come.
— Ezra Jun 23, 10:39 PM #
Recording lectures is often one of the great MIS-uses of video. I keep telling faculty that it’s possible to be a great teacher or a lousy teacher in any medium, including face-to-face. Transplanting a ‘talking head’ lecture to video is not very effective, unless that lecture is tailored to video with graphics, demonstrations or other aspects that change the visual aspects of the presentations. Recorded lectures are generally BOOOOORING.
— Al Jun 24, 12:20 PM #
As Peter Murray points out, you can no more record a course than you can record a cocktail party. Courses are social events: you have to be there (if only virtually) to experience them. The archive is only a recording.
That said, recordings of lectures can be useful along with books and other media to promote learning. I look forward to browsing this resource.
— JS Clark Jun 24, 05:12 PM #