Chinese Universities Moocs - 中国大学 Moocs

[Luxi]

Besides the better known platforms like edX, Coursera, FutureLearn etc. that we're familiar with, there is  a 100% Chinese moocs platform that most people outside China probably don't know about:  中国大学 Moocs

 

I only discovered it accidentally searching for something totally unrelated, as one does, and was quite amazed at the number and variety of courses on offer.  All the courses are in Mandarin and without any subtitles, not even in Chinese. For foreign students to be able to follow requires upper intermediate or higher level.  It's jumping at the deep end, though it is a fantastic learning resource for those of us who can't attend courses in China. Well worth having a look.

 

I registered using my Weibo login, my UK location is obvious from my IP address and I had no problems.The course I joined is about to start, it is organized by 华中农业大学 (Huazhong Agricultural University). It's called 魅力汉语 (Fascinating Chinese) and is a very interesting and well presented introduction to basic Mandarin linguistics (I was able to see some of the classes from the previous run). The teacher, Professor Lan Xia, is unusually clear and her clases are well organized. There are no subtitles or transcript, but a good part of the lectures' content is given also on slides, no downloads but one can print the screen. 

 

All the moocs in this platform can also be accessed from dedicated Android and IOS apps and the classes can be downloaded from the app to watch offline.

 

 

 

[fabiothebest]

I didn't know about icourse163.org . I add xuetangx to the list then. It's great but I didn't follow any course yet because I'd like to have a better Chinese before.

[Not Nicky]

I'm keen to try out a mooc or two in Chinese when I've got some free time too. There's another one called 网易公开 (https://open.163.com/) but my impression is that they've sort of scraped content from edx and the like. 

[Luxi]

@Not Nicky just in case, the link you give is not part of Zhongguo Daxue Moocs, 中国大学 Moocs！Besides the Ted talks, I don't know the other courses on the page you linked. I think '163.org' must be a portal like msn, AOL, etc.

 

中国大学 Moocs has hundreds of courses. I only looked into the 文学历史 area and found 8 - 10 I would have wanted to start straight away, including things like guided readings of several classics, History of Modern China, Tang poetry, Comparative Culture (China and the West), Ancient Chinese Characters, Reading Zhang Ailing, Food Culture, Tea (with the tea ceremony explained), History of Western Literature, and more, many more!

 

I settled for the one on Chinese linguistics (魅力汉语) and I'm very happy with what I've seen so far, but it does need time to be able to follow these courses without subtitles if you want to get something out of them. The good thing is, once you're registered for a course you have access to the material even after the scheduled course finished. And you do learn Chinese at the same time 

 

Not all the moocs in this platform are in Chinese, some are for Chinese people studying English. This is an interesting-looking one 印象英美——穿越时空之旅 .

 

 

[Not Nicky]

@Luxi Hey yeah it's not the same, I thought that was kind of weird actually. 163.com is huge, yeah it was like AOL, heaps of people have 163.com email address here too. 163.org on the other hand, is not a thing! So I guess they've just used that number for some reason. 

Anyway, I know how you feel about wanting to sign up for everything straight away! Let us know the next one you plan to do, I might join you!

[Luxi]

2018 update

 

As usual September brings a flood of new and repeated MOOCs from Chinese Universities. Since last year, the platform has grown massively and has a number of important improvements. Registration is as before, either direct or through WeChat, Weibo or QQ. Courses are free, but students who want a certificate have to pay.

 

This is the home page, listing the categories of MOOCs: 中国大学 MOOC (Chinese universities MOOC )
https://www.icourse163.org/

 

The improvements I noticed include: subtitles (in Chinese, but a few Chinese language courses also have English subs). Another welcome change: one can now vary the speed of the video player, the 0.75% speed seems to work well without distorting the voice too much. The selection of courses is now huge, the number in the Humanities section alone has doubled in a year. 

 

Edit to add: a very exciting development is that the Chrome / Firefox browser app Zhongwen can 'read' the subtitles (which in turn allows one to make words lists)

 

Here are some that might be of interest here, but this is by no means an exhaustive list. 

 

Specifically for foreign  learners: 

 

汉语 up up (Chinese up up - intermediate level)
https://www.icourse163.org/course/WHU-1002924016  

 

初级汉语语法  （Elementary grammar）
http://www.icourse163.org/course/BLCU-1002598041  

 

速成汉语语法课堂  (HSK4 and above, quick Chinese language and Culture learning)
https://www.icourse163.org/course/BLCU-1002536013

 

General humanities, for Chinese students and advanced level foreign students:

 

魅力汉语  (The Charm of Chinese )
https://www.icourse163.org/course/HZAU-1001741023

I enjoyed this one last year -with the exception of one week- and found it very useful. It should be better now if it is subtitled.  There is a thread about it somewhere here.

 

古代汉语 Ancient Chinese
https://www.icourse163.org/course/WHU-1002922024

 

a文字词汇  Chinese vocabulary (advanced)
https://www.icourse163.org/course/BNU-1003048003

 

中国现当代通俗小说与网络小说 Popular contemporary literature and online novels 
https://www.icourse163.org/course/SUDA-1001753308

 

I signed up for the Ancient Chinese course and these 2 on Tang poems

 

唐诗经典 Tang poetry (based on 300 Tang poems book)
https://www.icourse163.org/course/ZJU-1001614007

 

唐诗与长安文化 (Tang poems and the culture of Chang'An)
https://www.icourse163.org/course/SNNU-1002699014

 

[laurenth]

I'm trying to register with https://www.icourse163.org/ but it seems I cannot do it without a Chinese phone number. Is that correct (unfortunately) or am I doing something wrong? How did you register @Luxi?

 

[Edit] I registered with WeChat and just ignored the step where I am requested to give a phone number and it seems it worked.

Edited September 23, 2018 at 10:22 AM by laurenth

[Luxi]

1 hour ago, laurenth said:

Edit] I registered with WeChat 

 

I did the same using Weibo. Eventually you will have to register with a phone - its a Chinese government requirement, but Weibo and WeChat accept non-Chinese numbers.

 

 

[Luxi]

A few more moocs from Chinese Universities MOOCs. They keep on adding.

https://www.icourse163.org/

Tip: If browsing the course catalogue becomes too tiresome, try machine translation (there are apps for Chrome and Firefox that translate the whole page in one click via Google Translate, I guess Baidu has a similar thing). The translations I checked seem quite reasonable, though not perfect.

 

初级汉语口语 - Elementary Chinese 
Beijing Normal University
6 units starting 28/10/2018
https://www.icourse163.org/course/BNU-1002842008  

Business Chinese (China Business Overview) - 商务汉语（中国商务概览）
BLCU
Started 28/09/2018
"The Business Chinese Course is the core course of the Chinese language and economics direction of the Chinese Language Institute and the basis of the economic and trade knowledge course. The course is designed for students who are in the third year of the Chinese language major in economics and trade or have corresponding levels.
Students need to have intermediate Chinese level, and it is best to have 1500-2000 basic Chinese words."
https://www.icourse163.org/course/BLCU-1002732013  

 

Business Chinese (China Economic Focus) - 商务汉语（中国经济聚焦）  
BLCU
Started 28/09/2018

"Business Chinese is the core course of the Chinese language and economics direction of the Chinese Language Institute of Beijing Language and Culture University...The course covers the four major sectors of China's cultural industry, stock market, real estate market and macro economy...

The course requires students to review a large number of course-related materials and collate and summarize them, use them to explain their understanding of China's economic phenomena, and prepare for the graduation of the next semester."

(Advanced level)

https://www.icourse163.org/course/BLCU-1002841007  

古文字学 - Ancient Philology
Wuhan University 
Started 23/09/2018

https://www.icourse163.org/course/WHU-24002 

 Prerequisite knowledge: Ancient Chinese, exegesis, philology

So, VERY advanced

简明中国史（一）- Concise Chinese History (1)
Wuhan University. Starts 16/10/2018
This course teaches the history of politics, economics, military and culture in ancient China from the Neolithic Age to the early Qing Dynasty (from the origin of Chinese civilization to the upper and lower limits of the Opium War), focusing on the evolution of political and economic systems.
https://www.icourse163.org/course/WHU-1002924017  

 

I am very pleased with the 2 courses I'm currently doing, the standard is tops and the instructors in both courses are excellent. I'm delighted with the subtitles that respond to popup dictionaries (like Zhongwen), amazing!  Although these 2 moocs are hard, especially the one on ancient Chinese, it feels like time very well spent. 

古代汉语 - Ancient Chinese

唐诗经典 - Tang Poetry Classic

[Luxi]

On 9/22/2018 at 7:27 PM, Luxi said:

魅力汉语  (The Charm of Chinese )
https://www.icourse163.org/course/HZAU-1001741023

I enjoyed this one last year -with the exception of one week- and found it very useful. It should be better now if it is subtitled.  There is a thread about it somewhere here.

 

I signed up for the current session to check, but was disappointed. Unfortunately, it isn't subtitled (yet?).  I'd still recommend this course for upper intermediary to advanced students, despite a considerable amount of China flag-waving, 70% of the content is  worth the effort.

I noticed this time round that, having audited the mooc in the past, I can now understand the lectures without any problems - it seems to have done a lot for my 听力, besides teaching me about the Chinese language. First time round, I had to play each video several times to get the meaning.

 

The previous thread for this mooc is here - not easy to find unless you know it is there and can guess at least some of its title 

https://www.chinese-forums.com/forums/topic/53790-魅力汉语-the-charm-of-chinese-mooc/?tab=comments#comment-412446

 

 

 

[fabiothebest]

On 9/23/2018 at 12:12 PM, laurenth said:

it seems I cannot do it without a Chinese phone number. Is that correct (unfortunately) or am I doing something wrong?

I'm replying to an old comment, but it can be useful also for other people trying to register. You can register in multiple ways: wechat or weibo login, phone number or email. I used my email and I was asked to insert my phone number in order to get a verification code. I used a non Chinese number without problems, anyway the default settings only allow Chinese numbers, there is a button to press for international numbers where you can select your country code (immediately below the phone number field) and then you write the rest of your number. You'll get a verification code via sms within 30 seconds, you insert it in the form and click on the submit button, then you are done.

[Luxi]

33 minutes ago, fabiothebest said:

the default settings only allow Chinese numbers, there is a button to press for international numbers

 

That button is new, good! That may explain why the intermediate Chinese students increased from 400 to 1000 in a few hours.

 

They have been steadily improving and making things easier for students, as well as increasing the number of courses. IMO they're now the best Chinese platform.

[bande]

I am not sure if it counts as a MOOC, but I just came across course lectures from 国立交通大学 or National Chiao Tung University(NCTU) in Taiwan on youtube. The first lecture on middle east history seemed pretty good. I am sorry for the random bold text. I am on my phone and can’t seem to turn it off.

[Janine Hua]

Hello, can anyone register for an account at icourse163 now? I followed through the steps specified above, but cannot find a button to switch to international numbers. I know that the site is linked with 网易, but even if I signed in with my 网易 account (which already has a phone number binded to it), I still have to go through the phone number binding step again.

[Luxi]

On 9/28/2021 at 5:28 PM, Janine Hua said:

can anyone register for an account at icourse163 now?

 

Yes, everything still the same. If you already registered using your 网易 account, you are OK and can register for the courses, even if you haven't been able to bind your phone with the platform. The message you see asking you to bind your phone has a faint line at the bottom saying  something like 'I will bind later', tick that box and enjoy the moocs! It's better if you fill in some of your Profile with the mooc platform (email especially).

 

I have been getting that same binding message every time I have to re-log in for the last 2+ years ? and I also have been looking for the 'International' message that @Fabiothegood saw and failed to find it. I don't think he saw it on the 中国大学MOOC site, he must have seen  on some of the partner NetEase sites.

 

It's faster to log in if you install the platform's App in an iOS or Android phone using the same account and email you used to register. Then you can  re-login for the mooc platform scanning a code on the website without hving to sign again for a long time.

[abcdefg]

On 10/15/2018 at 10:05 AM, Luxi said:

I noticed this time round that, having audited the mooc in the past, I can now understand the lectures without any problems - it seems to have done a lot for my 听力, besides teaching me about the Chinese language. First time round, I had to play each video several times to get the meaning.

 

I'll bet it was good to see that improvement. It's a bonus to the actual course content! I'm envious; my Chinese will probably never be up to that kind of a challenge. 

[Janine Hua]

On 9/29/2021 at 4:01 PM, Luxi said:

The message you see asking you to bind your phone has a faint line at the bottom saying  something like 'I will bind later', tick that box and enjoy the moocs! It's better if you fill in some of your Profile with the mooc platform (email especially)

Hello, thank you for your reply. I retried login in by both Brave, Firefox and Android app but there's no such bottom line (I have attached a screenshot here). Maybe it has something to do with recently created accounts?

 

Sorry for replying late, I really should set up an email notification.

[Janine Hua]

Good news for those who encounter the same problem with me: I have found a workaround (accidentally)!

 

It turns out icourse163 has launched an international version called https://www.icourse163.com/ (similar to the Chinese site, but ends in .com instead of .org). Interestingly, when you navigate to any course on this 'international version', the address changes into something like this: https://www.icourse163.org/en/mooc/learn/[insert course here].

 

Which means, if you can log in the international site, it will redirect you to the Chinese site!

 

Luckily, login in the international site is very easy: It allows you to login with Google account.

 

After successfully login in, it still shows that you haven't logged in (see first image). Don't worry, this is a bug from their site. Just click on 'Courses' and choose any random course. Then, the address change from '.com' to '.org', and you realize you have successfully login to the Chinese version! (see second image).

 

Now, if I go to 'https://www.icourse163.com/', it still prompts me to verify my phone number, but now the line "I will bind later" appears and I can easily skip it.

 

Hope this helps!

 

 

[Luxi]

On 10/9/2021 at 3:23 PM, Janine Hua said:

I have found a workaround (accidentally)!

Hahaha, we're all getting different registration options, even sites, it must depend on karma ? 

To be fair, I registered several years ago, before the rules and laws started to get tightened. Hard to believe how complicated things have become in the very last few years.

 

The main thing is that you were able to register. I'm glad! There are many interesting courses in all fields, enjoy！