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I believe in free education, one that’s available to everyone; no matter their race, gender, age, wealth, etc… This masterpost was created for every knowledge hungry individual out there. I hope it will serve you well. Enjoy!

FREE ONLINE COURSES (here are listed websites that provide huge variety of courses)

Alison 

Coursera

FutureLearn

open2study

Khan Academy

edX

P2P U

Academic Earth

iversity

Stanford Online

MIT Open Courseware

Open Yale Courses

BBC Learning

OpenLearn

Carnegie Mellon University OLI

University of Reddit

Saylor

IDEAS, INSPIRATION & NEWS (websites which deliver educational content meant to entertain you and stimulate your brain)

TED

FORA

Big Think 

99u

BBC Future

Seriously Amazing

How Stuff Works

Discovery News

National Geographic

Science News

Popular Science

IFLScience

YouTube Edu

NewScientist

DIY & HOW-TO’S (Don’t know how to do that? Want to learn how to do it yourself? Here are some great websites.)

wikiHow

Wonder How To

instructables

eHow

Howcast

MAKE

Do it yourself

FREE TEXTBOOKS & E-BOOKS

OpenStax CNX

Open Textbooks

Bookboon

Textbook Revolution

E-books Directory

FullBooks

Books Should Be Free

Classic Reader

Read Print

Project Gutenberg

AudioBooks For Free

LibriVox

Poem Hunter

Bartleby

MIT Classics

Many Books

Open Textbooks BCcampus

Open Textbook Library

WikiBooks

SCIENTIFIC ARTICLES & JOURNALS

Directory of Open Access Journals

Scitable

PLOS

Wiley Open Access

Springer Open

Oxford Open

Elsevier Open Access

ArXiv

Open Access Library

LEARN:

1. LANGUAGES

Duolingo

BBC Languages

Learn A Language

101languages

Memrise

Livemocha

Foreign Services Institute

My Languages

Surface Languages

Lingualia

OmniGlot

OpenCulture’s Language links

2. COMPUTER SCIENCE & PROGRAMMING

Codecademy

Programmr

GA Dash

CodeHS

w3schools

Code Avengers

Codelearn

The Code Player

Code School

Code.org

Programming Motherf*?$%#

Bento

Bucky’s room

WiBit

Learn Code the Hard Way

Mozilla Developer Network

Microsoft Virtual Academy

3. YOGA & MEDITATION

Learning Yoga

Learn Meditation

Yome

Free Meditation

Online Meditation

Do Yoga With Me

Yoga Learning Center

4. PHOTOGRAPHY & FILMMAKING

Exposure Guide

The Bastards Book of Photography

Cambridge in Color

Best Photo Lessons

Photography Course

Production Now

nyvs

Learn About Film

Film School Online

5. DRAWING & PAINTING

Enliighten

Ctrl+Paint

ArtGraphica

Google Cultural Institute

Drawspace

DragoArt

WetCanvas

6. INSTRUMENTS & MUSIC THEORY

Music Theory

Teoria

Music Theory Videos

Furmanczyk Academy of Music

Dave Conservatoire

Petrucci Music Library

Justin Guitar

Guitar Lessons

Piano Lessons

Zebra Keys

Play Bass Now

7. OTHER UNCATEGORIZED SKILLS

Investopedia

The Chess Website

Chesscademy

Chess.com

Spreeder

ReadSpeeder

First Aid for Free

First Aid Web

NHS Choices

Wolfram Demonstrations Project

Please feel free to add more learning focused websites. 

Before the lecture: 

print off or download lecture slides (if available) 

preview content or lecture outline the night before 

make sure you’ve got all the supplies you need (eg. highlighters, pens, paper, post-its, books, charger for laptop if needed) 

During the lecture: 

actually listen lol and try to understand what’s being said

annotate the lecture slides

if there’s anything the lecturer emphasises, highlight it!

add any additional information that’s not in the slides

bring a bottle of water and/or some gum to help you keep awake and focused

turn your phone off or put it away in your bag to keep distractions to a minimum

when using a laptop to take notes, it’s tempting to start looking at other websites… don’t do it lol

i see so many people in the lecture hall scrolling through their facebook feeds

or tumblr (!!!)

but it’s honestly just a waste of time to attend if you’re not listening 

After the lecture: 

discuss with friends!

talking about a topic or explaining a concept to someone can really help consolidate your own knowledge 

or even bring up points for clarification 

if there’s anything you don’t understand, send the lecturer an email or go to their office hours

look over notes made during lecture within the same day

listen to the recording and add any missed information to your notes

go through relevant parts in the textbook

review, review, review! 

weekends are a great time for this

the more you review, the better you’ll be able to retain the contents of the lecture 

19tc Masterpost

reblog this if you post over 80% studyblr

maybe follow me if u want to ??

follow at least 5 other people who reblogged this (or more! we’re all studyblrs so it can’t hurt)

watch ur follower count grow!!  🌟

1. “I Don’t Know where to Begin.”

Make a list of all the things you have to do. Break your workload down ito manageable chunks. Prioritize. Schedule your time realistically. Begin studying early, with an hour or two per day, and slowly build as the exam approaches.

2. ‘I’ve Got So Much to Study…And so Little Time"

Preview. Survey your syllabus, reading material, and notes. Identify the most important topics emphasized, and areas still not understood. Previewing saves time, by helping you organize and focus in on the main topics.

3. “This Stuff is so Dry, I can’t Even Stay Awake Reading It”

Get actively involved with the text as you read. Ask yourself, “What is important to remember about this section?” Take notes or underline key concepts. Discuss the material with others in your class. Stay on the offensive.

4. “I Read It. I Understand It. But I Just Can’t Get it To Sink In”

Elaborate. We remember best the things that are most meaningful to us. As you are reading, try to elaborate upon new information with your own examples. Try to integrate what you’re studying with what you already know. You will be able to remember new material better if you can link it to something that’s already meaningful to you.

Chunking: Example: to remember the colors in the visible spectrum, Rog G.Biv –> reduce the information the three “chunks”.

Mnemonics: Associate new information with something familiar.

5. “I Guess I Understand It”

Test yourself. Make up questions about key sections in notes or reading. Examine the relationships between concepts and sections. Often, imply by changing section headings you can generate many effective questions.

6. “There’s Too Much to Remember”

Organize. Information is recalled better if it is represented in an organized framework that will make retrieval more systematic.

Write chapter outlines of summaries; emphasize relationships between sections.

Group information into categories or hierarchies, where possible.

Information Mapping. Draw up a matrix to organize and interrelate material.

7. “I Knew It A Minute Ago”

Review. After reading a section, try to recall the information contained in it. Try answering the questions you made up for that section. If you cannot recall enough, re-read portions you had trouble remembering. The more time you spend studying, the more you tend to recall. Even after the point where information can be perfectly recalled, further study makes the material less likely to be forgotten entirely. How you organize and integrate new information is still more important than how much time you spend studying.

Heyo, so school is fast approaching, and seeing as Tumblr is made up of a lot of younger users who will soon be shipping off to college or university soon, I thought I would take it upon myself to help spread my knowledge of essay-writing. Essay-writing is my thing. I love it. I live for it. It’s how I make up for my shitty test marks, and still get by with an 85 average+ in University classes. I’m a historian by trade, so perhaps this information will seem a bit off from what you’re used to, but hopefully, It’ll help you out. If you have any questions, feel free to shoot me an ask.

1. Consider your question and find your thesis.

      I know, I know. People always say, no! Never start with your thesis/intro paragraph! Go to the body!! Well i’m here to say forget everything you’ve been told. Forget that, forget the stupid hamburger shit they teach you, forget it all and start reading. 

I ALWAYS start with my thesis. Why? Because you cannot make good paragraphs without knowing what you’re researching. You need direction, and a thesis is your map.

So, the question we’ll use shall be: What is one way in which the Union won the American Civil War?

Now remember, your thesis is your map. It shows you where to go, what to look for. The thesis is the heart and soul of all your work. You want a good, solid thesis. What does that include, you ask?

An idea

A reason for said idea

Evidence to support said reason, and thus validate the        idea.

So, lets do an example. Let’s say I’m writing on the use of media during the American Civil War. I like photography, and wrote a paper on this in my second year, but im gonna be doing this example freehand(idk where I put that essay lol) so lets work with how I got an A+ on that paper. This will be my idea:

                “Photography during the American Civil War influenced the war’s outcome in the Norths favour.”

This is VERY vague. This is an example of a thesis in bloom! Let’s take it further. Look at the above. What questions would you have from this thesis?

-Who was taking photos at that time?

-Why did it influence the outcome?

-How did it influence the outcome?

-Who consumed photography as a media at that time?

This is where you STOP, and start the next step.

2. Research

                Start your basic research with your idea, and the above questions in mind. Look at libraries, ask your professor or TA or librarian, or just do some basic google searches to get to know the subject(but for the love of god if you include a google link in your citation I will personally hunt you down and castrate you.)

I like to start with the basics of any inquiry: WHO, WHAT, WHERE, WHEN, WHY, HOW. Who was taking photos? Where were they displayed that caused influence? ect…These, in relation to your beginner thesis, will help guide you in what form your thesis will take.

Once you’ve finished that, and have a general feel for the time period, go back to your thesis.

3. THESIS 2.0

Go back to your original question: What is one way in which the Union won the American Civil War? Now look at your thesis again. It’s too vague, isn’t it?

As you can see, our original thesis was too vague to be a real thesis. So, we NARROW IT DOWN using our WWWWWH progress we focused on during early research!

                “Photography during the American Civil war influenced the war’s outcome by providing a visual for ordinary citizens about the horrors of war, and thus helping to increase donations and awareness to the cause.”

Great! But once again, too vague! Questions that may arise include:

Who was taking the photos

Evidence for donations?

Evidence for social awareness?

So, we NARROW IT DOWN again. I’m going to use Andrew Gardner’s photography during the Civil war, as he was one of the most famous and influential at the time.

                “Andrew Gardner’s photography during the American Civil war influenced the war’s outcome by providing a visual for ordinary citizens about the horrors of war, and thus helping to increase donations and enlistment in the Union through awareness to the cause…”

The above then gives us the following(why and how are sometimes grouped together):

Who: Andrew Gardner

What: Photography helped the north win the war.

Where: Union-aka northern states

When: American Civil War

Why/How: Because Andrew Gardner’s photography raised social awareness through this new and budding medium

Use this sort of outline to guide you in the next step!

4. Now that we have a thesis, you need to do some more research and evidence gathering.

The way I like to do this is to go check out a few books from the library(look for text books in particular), and leaf through the index for matching terms. Our matching terms would be:

                Photography, civil war, Andrew Gardner, media

From there, you read over the pages, and see if any of the info relates to your subjects. Copy down quotes, page numbers, book title, author, publishing date and publisher. You need these for your bibliography. Pick and choose relevant information. The filter for relevant information relies entirely on your thesis, because it decides what you need to be looking for—this is why I hate when people tell me to start writing paragraphs before I write a thesis! It’s simply impossible and counter productive, and will cost you hours in revision.

So, gather your information from the library, and cross-reference with peer-reviewed articles and data. For our thesis, we would need data on enlistment numbers in an area after a date of Andrew Gardner’s photography exhibit showcases. No matter what type of essay you’re writing, you can always back up your evidence with data, and it won’t hurt one bit. Don’t be afraid of the numbers, kids!

So, if we were to go back to our thesis, we could now expand on it like this:

             “Andrew Gardner’s photography during the American Civil war influenced the war’s outcome by providing a visual for ordinary citizens about the horrors of war, and thus helping to increase donations and enlistment in the Union through awareness to the cause. An increase in  donations and enlistment in relation to exposure to Gardners work is seen in data/evidence point A, as well as in data/evidence point B, which will be fully outlined in the points below.”

This gives you an example of how to lead from a thesis, to your opening paragraph.

5. Data and Evidence Justifications–Paragraph making

This is the section where you can branch your essay into your data and evidence points you gathered in steps 2 and 4. You can have as many paragraphs as you like, just make sure your evidence and data is strong and supported. I personally like to work with my thesis copied and pasted onto the top of every page I write on. This keeps you on track, with your clear goal in mind, and will help you from straying. I will give you an example of how a paragraph might sound.

                Andrew Gardner’s photography during the American Civil War became heavily influential upon the American population at the time, particularly the north, wherein which his work was showcased. The influence of Gardner’s photographic works is seen in the _____, which shows us that without the influence of Gardner’s media influence, war efforts and awareness may not have been as successful as they had been.

This is an alright opener for you to work with. The ___ is where you could put in your data point or evidence piece. The point of the paragraph is to show your support for your thesis by confirming it with evidence.

Your paragraphs should take this form:

Present, Confirm, Conclude, Lead.

You present your evidence, confirm its relation to the thesis and confirm the validity of the thesis, conclude by brief revision of evidence, and then lead into your next paragraph. 

6. Conclusion

        Your conclusionary paragraph should be a look-over of the above paragraphs. Restate your thesis, present a summarized version of your paragraphs(one or two sentences only), and perhaps take the time to look at your own views on the subject. An example might look like this:

        “Taking a moment to step away from the above mentioned evidence, I believe it to be scholarly acceptable and even necessary to state my own views on the subject presented. In drawing conclusions, I felt that the above information was correct in that it presented a reality of the time period, in which photography was becoming a medium to be embraced by popular society. People were not only astounded by Gardner’s photographs on a social level, but also a technical level. The astonishment people held at seeing the war-torn battle fields spurred them into action, and even today can still present feelings of dread, fear and loss when looking at his photos…blah blah blah”

Why is it scholarly acceptable and perhaps necessary to state your views? Oftentimes, it is to reassure the reader of your own personal bias’, which exist whether you like them or not, to the subject at hand. Having a small tidbit on your own thoughts about your research ect, breaking away from the third-person droning of an essay can be refreshing and welcoming for a prof at the end of his stack of essay reading. 

7. In summary

Thesis

WWWWWH

NARROW IT DOWN

Data and Evidence

Present, Confirm, Conclude, Lead

Self opinions/Conclude