I Miss Learning
July 10, 2024 11:46 AM   Subscribe

In this day and age of countless YouTube tutorials and channels, it should be easy to be autodidactic, but I find I'm missing the structure of a proper class. So...

  • Outside of traditional degree programs, what have you found to successfully engage that class itch?
  • How have you maintained your learning efforts?
  • What has worked for you to aid discovering new fields of study?
posted by drewbage1847 to Education (9 answers total) 25 users marked this as a favorite
 
Check your local university extension office! They almost surely have a master gardener program, likely a master naturalist program, and sometimes lots of other opportunities to get free or inexpensive classes in a variety of topics.
posted by SaltySalticid at 11:53 AM on July 10, 2024 [1 favorite]


My local community college has an amazing woodworking program and the classes I've taken include people of all ages. You don't need to do a degree to take classes and the prices are very economical. Added bonus--you can get a student discount on many things once you're enrolled. This is actually really nice if you want to learn something like Adobe Illustrator or Photoshop.
posted by shornco at 12:04 PM on July 10, 2024


Best answer: Community ed via the local community college, and parks and rec classes. Check the library for discussion groups.

If asynchronous works, my dad likes Great Courses (wait for them to go on sale, also a subscription-based app option now) and LinkedIn Learning (I can get it through my library, he gets it through Phi Beta Kappa).

You also just have to do a certain amount of research for your interests and area. My city has a Neighborhood Tree Steward program that was good for this. Naturalist societies (birds, plants, fungi) often have classes and/or weekend forays with a strong educational component.

Since you only mention watching YouTube videos and classes, I'll note that especially as you get more advanced in an area, being more active in planning your learning is so, so worth it, as is meeting other interested folks who will know of good resources. I love how easy taking classes is, but they can only take you so far.
posted by momus_window at 12:05 PM on July 10, 2024


Best answer: I'm currently in the middle of a 10 person reading group about Ovid's Metamorphoses hosted by the Catherine Project. Every week we read a portion of the book and just chat about it on Zoom for an hour and a half. There's a grad student facilitator but no homework or grades, and it's free. To me it's all the best stuff about taking a college humanities class without the boring/stressful parts.
posted by theodolite at 12:09 PM on July 10, 2024


If you like hands-on things, I found that be a volunteer -- particularly in a Scout troop, but also at our local community farm -- gave me access to people with passion and a desire to share that passion.

The kind of folks who like teaching kids are perfect for having a goofball like me as a student, too!
posted by wenestvedt at 12:51 PM on July 10, 2024


Best answer: MIT OpenCourseware is great if you want to learn academic subjects structured like traditional university classes. MIT just hosts free to use material for a whole bunch of classes that have been taught there. Some of them are just lecture slides and a syllabus, but if you filter your searches for courses with both lecture videos and assignments to get the ones you can actually use as a class for yourself.

I used it to teach myself linear algebra, since that was something I ended up using a lot but only picked up in bits and pieces over the course of a physics PhD without ever getting a specific class in it.
posted by Zalzidrax at 2:17 PM on July 10, 2024


Best answer: Also get in touch with past education institutions that you attended or were involved with.

There are the alumni programs, but also you are probably eligible to audit any current subjects so if you want a refresher or an introduction to a particular area, you can attend often for free or just a nominal fee.
posted by Barbara Spitzer at 7:00 PM on July 10, 2024


Response by poster: The funny part - MIT is my past educational institution! )

(Also I really wish my local community college had a better extension program. The best in town is UCLA, but that's a long ways away)
posted by drewbage1847 at 8:38 PM on July 10, 2024


I'm taking Italian classes at my local Istituto Italiano di Cultura. They have classic language classes and also a lot of different groups for more advanced speakers, like a class focused on the arts, or on the opera, or a theatre class.

A lot of countries will have these branches managed by the local Foreign Affairs ministry, dispensing language and culture classes: Alliance française (France), Istituto Italiano du Cultura (Italy), Goethe Institut (Germany), British Council (UK), etc.
posted by snakeling at 9:47 AM on July 11, 2024


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