An ode to Khan Academy – Caitanya Singh Jaswal

Before I start off, you should know something about me. I hate, abso-fruitily-lutely despise the education system in India. I think online sites do a job much better, and I learn ten times as much online as I do in an hour offline in school. But, I digress. This article is not about education; it’s about how to dump a body without getting caught!

What?

It is about education?

Oh. Okay. I guess I’ll talk about… *rummages through stack of papers*…

Top 10 alternatives to school? Not pertinent.

Top 10 drugs to enhance learning ability? Not allowed.

Oh, here’s a good one!

KHAN ACADEMY: GOD’S BLESSING ON THIS WONDERFUL WORLD!

Here’s a little titbit from Wikipedia:

Khan Academy is a non-profit educational organization created in 2006 by educator Salman Khan with a goal of creating a set of online tools that help educate students. The organization produces short lectures in the form of YouTube videos. Its website also includes supplementary practice exercises and materials for educators. All resources are available to users of the website. The website and its content are provided mainly English, but are also available in other languages like Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Russian, Turkish, French, Bengali and Hindi.

Great! Now that we have all the boring shtick out of the way, we can talk about why I love Khan Academy.

Now, there are (and you must have heard of) other popular academic sites like Coursera, Codecademy, MathIsFun, Udacity, etc. etc., but this article concentrates on Khan Academy for the sole, noble reason… that I don’t really visit the others that much. Gomen’nasai! (That’s Japanese for sorry. See, you learn something new everyday!)

REASON #1: ALL KNOWLEDGE

Khan Academy isn’t like other sites in the sense that it focusses on one kind of nationality’s students and their syllabus. All knowledge is equal, and one can find all kinds of knowledge, from Calculus to counting past 10, and from the mitochondria being the powerhouse of the cell to patterns in ecological movement of bees at Khan.

 

A single grey block could mean a subject like multivariable calculus that you haven’t even touched yet.

REASON #2: HIS VOICE

This might seem like a weird entry, but let’s just say I would rather have Khan whisper the Law of Sines into my ear than have a teacher dictate them.

Sleep now, my sweet summer child…

REASON #3: EASY ON THE EYES

…and I’m not just talking about the man himself! With an incredibly simple and easy to navigate UI, Khan Academy just… feels right!

The first page on the site sums it up so well you could call it a calculator. *pauses for applause*

Thank you, I’m here all week.

There’s not really much more to say about Khan Academy, so here’s some images with funny captions.

Khan has appeared on Ted Talks and is a great visionary. He’s a lot like Elon Musk in that way.

Most of the videos on KhanAcademy have been personally voiced over by Khan!

Here’s a picture of Khan in front of some numbers so I look like I know my stuff.

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