Teachers are a hard working breed. We put in extra time after school, help with extra curricular activities and make a lot of special days possible for our students. Teachers deserve the best learning platforms to inspire and educate. We have done all the research so you don’t have to! Here are the top online learning platforms for teachers and students.
Whether you are a teacher or want to become one, learning about online learning platforms for teachers and students may help in your school career. Online learning platforms for teachers provide you with the resources you need to teach your students effectively without being physically present in your classroom. These online learning platforms are available to both teachers and students at all levels of education.
Udemy
Udemy is one of the best online course platform marketplaces with over 24 million students, 35,000 instructors, and unbelievable 80,000+ courses. The first step to creating a course is to sign up to be a premium instructor.
Once your account is approved, it’s effortless to get started creating your courses. When creating your video content, keep in mind the material has to be at least 30 minutes long and contain five lectures.
Another benefit to adding your course on Udemy is that you can easily promote your class inside their platform. You can use their marketing features to be included in site-wide discounts, be placed in their marketing emails, or join their affiliate program with tiered commission rates.
What does Udemy cost?
It is free to use. They charge a 3% rev share for sales through instructor coupons, 50% for students who found your course through organic search (SEO), and 75% for transactions made through paid search marketing efforts.
Advantages
Udemy is one of the best online course platforms for professionals. The first advantage is that you get access to a large user base. Udemy’s 40 million users are all potential students who will pay for your course. But just because you’re on their platform, it doesn’t mean you’ll start raking in sales right away.
You have to develop a strong marketing and sales strategy, much like a new e-commerce company, author, or real estate agent. It’s all about getting your name out there.
They provide a substantial revenue share for tuition fees. Instructors set their course prices and receive revenue at 100% of the tuition fee for new users and 50% for existing users. That’s a substantial commission on sales and a massive benefit to using their platform.
You can participate in their marketing promotions. Every so often, they run promotions that can help you reach a larger audience on their platform. These marketing promotions are opt-in, so instructors can choose to participate or not.
They have reliable technology and support. They offer free 24/7 support, and they also have a vast library of helpful articles.
Disadvantages
There is intense competition with other courses. Instructors are at the mercy of the placement and appearance on the Udemy website, which is controlled by their proprietary algorithms.
It can be difficult to outrank other instructors on particular topics if you’re new to the platform.
There is also stiff competition with other course publishers. Udemy isn’t the only course marketplace ranking on search engines for your course topics.
Other marketplaces like iSpring Learn, LinkedIn Learning, Coursera, and Skillshare can compete with Udemy in organic search, which can be a disadvantage for instructors.
They have lenient return policies. Refunds are guaranteed to all students within 30 days for any reason. Because of this, students could take a course, complete it within 30 days, and get a guaranteed refund – decreasing your sales.
Udemy Review: Final Verdict
First, they’re one of the most well known, widely used, and professional online course marketplace out there. With a robust rev share model, a vast audience to tap into, 24/7 support, and marketing offerings, you can’t go wrong with their platform.
Although there is healthy competition with other course creators and platforms, the company is likely to maintain its lead in the market.
Get started with Udemy for free today.
GoToMeeting
GoToMeeting, as stated on their website, puts the “class in online classes.”
They are an up-and-coming competitor to some of the larger video platforms because of how they gear their functions to suit teachers and students in an online class.
With their free account, you can expect:
- Personal URLs for students to join the class
- Instant messaging, file sharing & screen sharing
- Powerful mobile capabilities for students
- Clean and simple interface with powerful functions
Unfortunately, their free version is quite limiting but it will allow you 40-minute classes/meetings but with only up to 3 participants.
GoToMeeting free would be perfect for independent tutors who have 1-3 students and classes under 40 minutes.
iSpring Free
iSpring Free is an eLearning authoring tool that allows you to turn boring PowerPoint presentations into mobile-compatible online courses with quizzes. The main advantage of the tool is its simplicity. Its intuitive interface enables any novice course developer to create an unlimited number of courses quickly and easily.
Kahoot
Kahoot is a game-based learning platform that lets you create fun learning games. You can make quizzes on any topic and in any language, and customize those quizzes with videos, diagrams, and images. Students participate in “kahoots” (games) by logging the game codes on their device or application.
Podia
Best All-In-One Online Course Platform for Webinars, Downloads, and Memberships ($39/month)
Podia is an all-in-one online course platform with over 50,000 members that is great for digital downloads, webinars, and memberships.
Its main types of courses include:
- Standalone courses that include images, video and audio files, MP3x, PDFs, quizzes, and more.
- Pre-sell your course by taking payments before launch.
- Cohort-based courses with a future start date.
- Drip courses deliver your course in a section-by-section format.
- The ability to add coupons and memberships.
They truly excel with their membership options. You can grow your own online community by interacting with members, bundling products for specific groups, offering tiered plans, and connecting with Facebook Groups and Slack.
Podia also acts as a webinar platform to host either live or on-demand webinars.
Another awesome feature is the ability to run your own affiliate program inside of Podia. You can view all of your affiliates in one place, view helpful reporting, and make payouts based on your own customized commission structure.
There is 24/7 support, no transaction fees, and a simple three-step process to get your course website up quickly.
Although they don’t charge fees, their payment processors have transaction fees of 2.9% + 30¢.
Pricing:
- Mover ($39/month) – Unlimited everything, zero transaction fees, sell courses, digital downloads, and 5k emails sent per month.
- Shaker ($79/month) – Everything in Mover, plus the ability to create membership communities, add affiliates, and 15k emails sent per month.
- Earthquaker ($179/month) – Everything in Shaker, plus dedicated account manager, personalized onboarding, and 50k emails sent per month.
Overall, if you’re looking for strong membership functionality and the ability to increase your sales with the help of affiliates, Podia is a unique and worthwhile course builder to try out.
Edpuzzle
With Edpuzzle, you can create interactive video lessons with embedded audio notes, assessments, and quizzes. Its analytics tool enables you to track how students are watching your videos and if they understand the content.
WeTransfer
The answer to your prayers. Transfer large files easily to colleagues and keep your ideas moving. It’s free and does not even require you to create an account. Just upload files, enter the recipient’s email and you’re away.
Canva
A brilliant, free graphic design tool you can use to create educational visuals and infographics for the classroom. It couldn’t be more intuitive and is loved by both beginners and experts alike. We guarantee you’ll be hooked.
Zoom
Zoom is probably the most popular online software in the market for holding meetings, classes and online get-togethers, especially since the start of the pandemic.
Zoom offers the following to their users:
- Chat function to
- chat with your whole class or individual students
- Breakout rooms to separate students into groups for discussions
- Share screen function to share your screen or allow students to share their screen
- A built-in whiteboard with text and drawing features to share with your students.
The free version allows up to 100 participants, unlimited one-on-one meetings but a limit of only 40 minutes for group meetings.
Zoom is a great option for teachers who need a platform to teach their students since this app is used worldwide and most people are comfortable and familiar with its functions.
EdApp
EdApp’s new public microlearning courseware platform Educate All is free for teachers, students and anyone else on the planet who has a desire to learn. Together with UNITAR, EdApp is redefining what we mean by ‘team micro teaching’ by creating a true global village of educators.
EdApp’s authoring tool is an excellent way to effectively educate your learners with vital knowledge and skills. EdApp’s content library is populated with course topics ranging from addressing global challenges, leadership and entrepreneurship to hospitality and physical exercise. Powerful learner metrics are available for learner assessment, and EdApp’s Brain Boost spaced repetition feature is next to none. You can access EdApp’s mobile-based LMS for free!
Seesaw
Seesaw is a digital portfolio app that captures student work through the use of photos, videos, and audio. This free teacher tool enables students to showcase their work and collaborate with their peers. Using the Seesaw blog platform, students gain an authentic sense of authorship and are able to share ideas and feedback constructively in a safe teacher-moderated space.
The app is also a fantastic way of enhancing parent-school engagement (which we all know is a key factor in positive student outcomes), as they are able to sign in with QR codes. The reflective opportunities Seesaw provides is my favourite feature. By getting students to reflect on teacher feedback, it completes the learning loop—essentially promoting ‘feeding forward’ rather than feedback as an effective learning model.
Baamboozle
This is another free online game site. Its main advantage is that it’s set up so that students can play online in teams, but they don’t have to go into different breakout rooms. In other words, students can select a question to answer and talk among themselves in front of others to determine the correct answer (other students are waiting for their turn to choose another question). If that explanation is a bit confusing, it will be very clear once you go to the site itself.
Quizizz
This is a free online learning game site that is incredibly easy to use, has zillions of already-made games on just about every topic that are fun activities for reinforcement and formative assessment, and has recently added a simplified Nearpod-like feature (for those of you familiar with that popular tool) called student-paced “Lessons.” My students love playing Quizizz games in teams divided into separate Zoom breakout rooms. Unlike other game sites, students can see the question and the possible answers on the same screen and don’t have to split them into two.
Math Learning Center
This virtual manipulative website is a staple in mathematics classrooms where students interact with familiar manipulatives such as base 10 blocks. Teachers can customize the site by creating problems, saving templates, and sharing private links with students. The best part is that the tools encourage flexible thinking as students explore multiple ways to model their understanding.
Conclusion:
Over the last few years, online learning has rapidly become a dominant force in education. What used to be considered a novelty has become a staple in thousands of classrooms across the globe, and rightly so. Online learning programs can offer many benefits to both teachers and students. However, choosing the right platform for you can be an overwhelming task.