Unit 2: Enrolling in Courses
Now that you have created an account, you are able to enroll in any* of Saylor Academy's 90+ courses, including this one. This unit will show you how to enroll in a course as well as where to find lists and descriptions of all of our courses.
*All Saylor Academy courses are tuition-free and are self-paced, meaning there are no start/end dates and can be worked on whenever is convenient to you. There is also no need to apply -- if you see a course you are interested in, you are more than welcome to become a student of that course.
Completing this unit should take you approximately 45 minutes.
2.1 Exploring Catalog(s)
- Watch this video that will introduce you to the various course listings maintained by Saylor Academy.
Note: The "Pathways" page described in the second half of this video has changed. You can view the old page here.
Use the link to navigate to the course catalog found within the learn.saylor.org course site.
As mentioned in the preceding video, this listing does contain short course descriptions which will give you a general idea of what the courses teach. For more detailed information about the course, feel free to click into them and review the Course Introductions and Syllabi.
This list does also incorporate hidden keywords, to help enhance the search function provided. For instance, search for the words "college credit" to get a list of those courses that are recommended for credit by NCCRS and ACE or which are aligned to a third-party credit-by-exam option.
2.2 Exploring a Course
Before actually enrolling in a course, it is important that you know what you are getting into. One of the advantages of the Saylor site is that almost all course information is available for free, without even the need to be logged in. This allows students, teachers, and anyone else who is interested to get a very good idea of what any particular Saylor course is composed of and to determine whether or not it is right for them.
Use this link to go back to the course catalog. If you didn't already do so in the previous section, actually use the search feature or category listings to help find a course that may be of interest to you. Once you have found a course or interest, click the course link to be taken to the course's main page. Once on the course page, do the following to get an even clearer picture of what the course contains:
- Read the "Course Introduction" section for a more detailed overview of the course;
- Locate and open the "Course Syllabus," which will provide you with information about the learning objectives covered in the course, the expected number of hours the course will take to complete, information about the requirements to pass the course, and information and links about how to earn college credit from that course, if such options exist;
- From either the course main page, or the left side navigation block, explore the Units and Topics that are covered in the course.
The combination of these things should provide you with enough information to determine whether or not you'd like to continue in the course.
2.3 Enrolling in Courses
Watch this short video to learn how to enroll in courses right from a Saylor Academy course page.
The best way to practice the enrollment method described in the preceding video is to enroll in the course that you previously visited as part of subunit 2.2.
The link provided will direct you back to the course catalog. After you've enrolled in the course of your choice in that new tab, come back to this page and also go ahead and formally enroll in this course, Saylor001.
2.4 Accessing your Courses
Watch this video to learn a few a different tips about how to quickly and easily access any of the courses you have enrolled in.
Follow the link to go back to the site's homepage. Using what you learned in the previous video, navigate to the first course you enrolled in (not Saylor001). Once on that course page use what you learned about navigating to courses from within the learn.saylor.org site to quickly go to the Saylor001 course page in this new tab.
Unit 2 Assessment
Now that you are officially enrolled in this course, you are able to attempt one of the built in auto-graded assessments available to students on this course platform (while most course content is available to anyone, only students enrolled in a course can attempt the built in assessments for that course).
Before doing that though, a quick note about Saylor Academy assessments themselves. As you may have read while exploring the Course Syllabi for other courses, the requirement for passing a Saylor course is to successfully complete the course Final Exam with a score of 70% or higher. Final exams are meant to be summative (occurring at the end and concerned with your overall accomplishment), and while you are able to re-attempt a certificate exam after seven days, you will not be provided with the correct answers for questions that you got wrong.
Many of our courses also include other auto-graded and self-graded assessments along the way that we very much encourage students to take, even though the grade earned on them does not factor in to your final grade. These sorts of assessments are designed to be formative (occurring throughout the course to measure your ongoing progress), and are in many ways learning materials themselves -- the correct answers and feedback provided are designed to help you better understand the course topics and master the learning outcomes that will be tested on the final exam. These sorts of assessments range from shorter versions of what you might later encounter in the final exam -- with every item being scored immediately upon submission -- to essay-type assessments where you are asked to submit written work that you can evaluate yourself using the feedback or scoring rubrics provided. You may attempt these assessments as many times as you wish; unlike with final exams, there is no waiting period between your attempts.