Produced by The Open University, a world leader in open and distance learning, all OpenLearn courses are free to study. We offer nearly 1000 free courses across 8 different subject areas. Our courses are available to start right away.
A growing selection of our courses offer a free Open University digital badge. Badges demonstrate your interest in a subject, a commitment to your career or provide evidence of continuing professional development.
Got a few spare minutes? Brush up on your knowledge with our range of free bite-size courses and activities.
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Education & Development
Am I ready to be a distance learner?
Distance learning can open up opportunities for study. You might have not studied for a while, you might be returning to education, or you might not have had the chance to study at a higher level before. This free course, Am I ready to be a distance learner?, will help to boost your confidence. You'll explore useful skills so you can discover how ready you are to study and how to develop your study skills in six steps to become a successful distance learner.
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Languages
Beginners’ French: Food and drink
Improve your language skills by learning to communicate more easily and effectively in French. In this free course, Beginners' French: Food and drink, you will also gain an insight into French societies and cultures through focusing on food and drink. You will listen to French speakers in a variety of situations, and you will be provided with some skills for coping with reading texts.
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Education & Development
Children and young people: food and food marketing
This free course, Children and young people: food and food marketing, examines food as a health issue and addresses children and young people’s agency and their rights. It addresses obesity, food marketing and also food as a way of expressing children’s and young people’s identities (family, class, cultural, generational). Discussing key issues that in research and thinking about food, including how policies tackling obesity are framed, it draws across work from Childhood and Youth Studies and Psychology to challenge the rhetoric of 'healthy choices' and consider why it's essential to go beyond the individual to understand systems and environments that currently fail children and their health. The following video explores the concepts covered in this course.
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Education & Development
Dance skills
Dance communicates ideas through movement and is an expressive art form. Students need to learn how to use their body in a safe and healthy way, whilst developing a wide-ranging movement vocabulary. The use of different dance techniques can be an effective way of building vocabulary and developing different kinds of skills and abilities. Technical dance skills can form the foundation on which to develop and enhance each individual's performance. As dance teachers, we may have a range of skills, but it isn't always possible to possess expertise in every type of dance style and technique. Having the knowledge and experience to teach African Dance forms, Jazz Dance or Hip Hop to students is a great way of introducing them to a variety of styles and can be a rich and rewarding process. However, many teachers in schools and colleges work within a Contemporary Dance style because it will have been the basis of their education and training. In this free course, Dance skills, it is also the main point of reference.
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Education & Development
Attachment in the early years
This free course, Attachment in the early years, covers theory and research in the area of attachment in early childhood. In the 1950s, John Bowlby was the first person to develop a theory about the significance of early attachments between caregivers and very young children. His work has stimulated a massive and very productive field of research with important implications for childcare. This OpenLearn course describes Bowlby's theory and the work that has built on it, illustrated with video recordings of the assessment of attachment in a laboratory setting and a talk by an eminent attachment researcher.
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Education & Development
English: skills for learning
English: skills for learning, is a free course for anybody who is thinking of studying for a university degree and would like to develop the English reading and writing skills needed to succeed. You will learn through a range of engaging activities aimed at extending your existing language skills.
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Health, Sports & Psychology
Working with young people in sport and exercise
This free course, Working with young people in sport and exercise, examines the special considerations of coaching or instructing young people in sport and exercise. The physiological differences between children and adults will be considered along with the practical implications of coaching young people.
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Education & Development
Creating open educational resources
Are you interested in creating your own open educational resources? This free course, Creating open educational resources, will help you to write a learning course and provide you with links to various resources for open-learning materials. You will learn about the different purposes of self-instruction and receive advice about the techniques and strategies to help the learner.
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Education & Development
Get started with online learning
This free course will explain how you can study online without putting the rest of your life on hold.
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Health, Sports & Psychology
Exploring sport coaching and psychology
This free course, Exploring sport coaching and psychology, investigates how scientific and management ideas contribute to success while also taking you on a journey through unique sporting case studies and insights that will change how you view and study sport. You will consider how the mind, the body, the environment and training techniques all contribute to optimum fitness.
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Education & Development
Take your teaching online
In this free course, Take your teaching online, you will gain knowledge fundamental to delivering effective teaching online. You will hear about the experiences of real educators, be introduced to cutting edge research, and understand the ideas and tools that shape how we teach and learn online. You will also learn useful methods that will guide you to test out these new ideas in your own practice.
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Money & Business
Understanding your sector
This free course, Understanding your sector, will help you to understand the difference between sectors, industries and professions. It will also help you to gain the inside knowledge to impress in applications and at interviews and to put together an action plan that is tailored to you.