With the COVID-19 virus officially declared a pandemic, it is best to stay at home and maintain social distancing. For your own safety and that of others, refrain from leaving your house unless absolutely necessary and take the correct safety measures as directed by the WHO. You must be wondering, what should I do staying at home all that time? While you wait for this crisis to pass, you can use this time to learn a skill you’ve always wanted to learn but never found the time. You can learn a language, programming, art, marketing analytics, or any other skill you think could be useful or fun.

Here is a list of websites you can go to access an online course for free and get started!

MOOC.org

Ivy league schools may be extremely selective and difficult to get into but they also offer hundreds of free online courses known as MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses). These are easy to access and available across multiple platforms. There are several diverse categories to choose, such as:

• Computer Science
• Language
• Business & Management
• Engineering
• Art and Design
• Humanities.

Some of these courses end with a completion certificate that you can add to your resume or LinkedIn profile.

Google Digital Garage

If you’re looking to hone some digital skills, Google Digital Garage is the best place to go. Choose from:

• Data and Technology
• Digital Marketing
• Career Development

Source: Google Programme

This platform provides free tutorials from experts that can help you make sales online, increase social media reach or just get more views for your videos. Earn an accredited certificate from Google and IAB Europe for completing a full course.

HubSpot Academy

If you’re a marketing, sales, or customer service professional, you would find a treasure of free and useful online courses at HubSpot Academy. They have full-length certifications and short refresher courses for the benefit of professionals looking to stay updated on cutting-edge business skills. Their courses can help you grow your business and adding their globally recognized certifications to your LinkedIn profile can help you impress potential employers. These courses educate users on the usage and benefits of the HubSpot software platform.

Source: Hubspot Academy

Memrise

Memrise is a language and vocabulary learning application platform that teaches users real conversational language in a fun way. Memrise is a free service with over 300,000different language courses. Founded by neuroscientists, the Memrise app uses a combination of memorization techniques, entertainment and community learning to help users efficiently learn their language of choice. It’s effectiveness and popularity made it the Google Play Awards Best App winner in 2017.

Source: Memrise.com

Codecademy

For anyone that wants to learn how to code, Codecademy is a great resource. One of the largest online coding platforms, Codecademy offers coding classes in 12 different programming languages. These include Python, Java, JavaScript, Ruby, SQL, C++, Swift, and Sass, as well as markup languages HTML and CSS. The classes are completely free meaning no monthly subscriptions or payments per class. It’s the best place to give coding a go and see if it’s something you enjoy doing.

SkillShare

SkillShare is a wonderful site for creatives who want to learn new skills from industry professionals. You can get an in-depth look at the creative industry and the work and processes through the online courses on SkillShare. Whether it’s photography, film, illustration or music, if you’re interested in learning anything related to art these courses would be very helpful. It offers thousands of courses for free for a two-month trial period. You can use this time to test it out, learn as much as you can and see if you then want to pay the $10 a month fee to continue learning.

If the social isolation is getting to you, you can even start a course with a friend to encourage each other and share progress (from a distance). We hope these courses make social distancing easier for you. Stay safe, stay indoors!