Tips for getting the best out of online courses
Tags: selftaught, courses, coding, learning
Published: 2020-04-17 19:34:03

---
title: Tips for getting the best out of online courses
published: true
description: A few things to keep in mind when following the self-taught route
tags: self-taught, courses, coding, learning
cover_image: https://res.cloudinary.com/stealthman22/image/upload/v1587157330/new-portfolio/showcase/person-drinking-lemon-tea-in-front-of-her-laptop-3972379-m.jpg
---

Often times when people choose to better themselves in an online setting, it is a bit of a struggle. 
This is because there are tons of different activities competing for your time: some useful, and some not. Especially owning to the fact that no one is really keeping you accountable, as in a school setting.

 But with a few guidelines, you can stop the procrastination, and prevent time from ticking your opportunities away.

Below I will share some pointers with you that will enable you to get the best out of your studies online. Believe me when I say I learnt some of these the hard way.
Here goes the list:

1. Zen Mode (Zone Out)
2. Be Creative
3. Take Notes 
4. Research
5.Commit
6. Have fun


## 1.  Zen Mode (Zone Out):

First and foremost, enforce the classroom environment when learning online. Zone out. This can't be over-emphasized, because there is mostly no one to enforce concentration, hence you might keep playing around. 
The worst distractors are chatty friends and your phone. Put both of them on airplane mode, and enter your Zen-mode (A place of utmost concentration).

## 2. Be Creative:

Creativity is the root of all great inventions. The good thing is you do not have to be an Einstein to be creative. When learning especially online ensure to experiment, don't be boring; mix things up, shake things up, learn 1000 ways it doesn't work.
Do not limit yourself to what is being taught, be ready to extend beyond the borders, and do not be afraid to break things (Do not break your computer tho).

## 3. Take Notes:

Please your head is not a hard disk drive, nor a sales ledger. Allow your pens do the storage. Write as much as you can, It is your best shot at breaking the knowledge being passed down into understandable bits. Most online courses are fast-paced, and you might get fooled to thinking "you got it all", trust me: you don't. Write the notes and pen down your ideas, and most importantly your progress.

## 4. Research: 

When learning online, you are mostly connected to the internet, but the thing is your tutor is not with you when you need to ask a question. Hence your favourite search engine is your best friend, and sites like wikipedia.org and stackoverflow.com (for techies) are storehouses of knowledge.
Ask all questions, be thirsty for knowledge. You might just learn way more than you expected to.

## 5. Commit:

Do not start dancing around when taking an online course (Well even if it's a dancing course). Learn to finish what you started, if you pick one course, learn to commit to the end. The gold mine might just be in the last sentence. If you do not learn to do this, you will be missing out of a lot, and might never make any tangible progress. It could be daunting, but hey, nothing good comes easy you know.

## 6. Have Fun:

This is not a war, I repeat this is not a war. Find ways to have fun when learning online. connect and interact with tutors and fellow coursemates, you might be isolated from them physically, but you can connect your minds. Think "Team", not "Individual".

I hope you have learnt something? if you would like to follow me on social media, my account links are down below. 
Image credit to Ada, Grab it here [Pexels](https://www.pexels.com/photo/person-drinking-lemon-tea-in-front-of-her-laptop-3972379/)
Thank you for your time.
Cheers and Happy learning.

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