Wednesday, July 23, 2008

Free Online Courses That Improve Your Writing

Career Center - by Carie Bishop

If you’re studying in an online college degree or certification program, your writing may be the only way your teachers can judge your merit. Whether you’re writing emails, taking online tests, or delivering college papers, your ability to craft clear, well-written prose can be your greatest asset.

Getting up to speed in researching, organizing, and creating academic papers can be an especially daunting task for returning students or for those enrolled in continuing education. That’s why you’ll appreciate knowing about these free, online courses, study guides, and downloadable reference materials for college-level academic writing offered by several major universities.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology
The online branch of this celebrated university offers free classes, including Reading and Writing the Essay, Writing About Literature, Introduction to Technical Communication, Science and Engineering Writing, Rhetoric, and more. Through its OpenCourseWare initiative, MIT provides all of its college degree materials online.

Purdue University Writing Lab
The Boilermakers offer more than 200 free resources for writers, including online courses on subjects including how to create a thesis, conquering APA and MLA paper styles, how to avoid plagiarism, how to develop an outline, and other invaluable tips.

Western Governor’s University
WGU offers a five-week, self-paced course in rhetorical writing and critical thinking, a mainstay class for creating papers in academe. Learn how to write for an audience, sharpen grammar usage and mechanics, and how to create arguments to support a thesis.

Utah State University
USU offers free courses in introductory academic prose writing, intermediate research and persuasive writing, and technology for professional writers through its online division. You’ll also find free online library resources and a college English handbook as part of its OpenCourseWare participation.

More than 200 colleges and universities participate in the OpenCourseWare consortium. To search for other free English classes, visit their website.