Treehouse

Treehouse is a self-paced learning site for web design, coding, business, and more. Its developers are constantly adding more material but always include beginner, intermediate, and expert help. With over a dozen tracks for learning, each takes from a few hours to a few dozen hours to complete. Examples of tracks include Web Design, Starting a Business, WordPress Development, Android Development, Learn Java, and iOS Development with Swift 2.0. Students can also learn on the go with the free Treehouse app.

Students start each track by watching a series of videos, then take quizzes and try out their new coding knowledge. Badges can be earned for successful completion of skills. The videos are professionally done and are generally short, making it easy to learn in spurts if necessary. The website is intuitive and clearly laid out and contains a forum for help and support from fellow learners. After the seven-day free trial (which requires inputting payment information), users can subscribe to the Basic plan (access all the videos, practice online with the Code Challenge Engine, and participate in the forums) or the Pro plan (access additional talks from industry leaders, see bonus content, and download the videos). Users can cancel or pause their accounts at any time.

Treehouse is especially good for students who do well with self-paced learning. There's tons of knowledge and experience to gain on a vast array of subjects, from software development to web development to coding. Also, if kids want to learn the basics of starting a business, doing user-interface design, or using WordPress to make a website, they'll learn lots here. Students can go through full sequential tracks, or they can pick and choose the particular lessons that interest them. Students can access any parts of the site and aren't restricted to only one track. There's also a dashboard where students can see all their classes in progress, items they've bookmarked, and lessons completed. If they're learning programming, students can practice writing their own code within the website in the Workspaces section, creating their own games, programs, and apps. They can access their account and Workspaces from anywhere, since there is nothing to install.

The site's video and other offerings all include clear instructions and possess a logical progression. Treehouse is a great place to get students started in learning something new, or they can augment their knowledge in an area they already know a bit about. The video lessons get them started, and the practice allows them to try their hand at creating, while the community keeps them going if they get stuck. There are enough lessons in most of the tracks to really gain deep knowledge, but each one still starts off gently enough to ease students in. There are also optional Extra Credit activities to extend learning further.