Fall is approaching, and a return to a more regular office schedule awaits for many people – and with it, the wait time for transportation, meetings, and appointments. Games, reading, social-media scrolls or just zoning out are common ways to spend these spells, but if you want more mental stimulation, why not boost your Brainstorm short lessons on topics that interest you? Here’s a guide to finding Android and iOS apps that turn your smartphone into a traveling pocket tutor.
Learn a language
Web-based academic courses and music lessons have flourished over the past few years, especially as distance learning has become a part of pandemic life. Although Apple and Google have their own free translation apps, some people find online language lessons useful. No one wants to hear you practice your French pronunciation on a commuter train, but some language learning apps offer free or inexpensive vocabulary and grammar tutorials that you can do silently or with headphones on.
Babel, Duolingo, Memrise and Rosetta Stone is among those offering short lessons for a wide selection of languages. Each app requires a user account that you must set up for the lessons to track your progress. Both Duolingo and Memrise have free plans along with paid options, and tend to make learning more gamelike with videos and touch-screen exercises; remember Duolingo recently suffered a user data breach. Babbel and Rosetta Stone focus more on communication skills and require you to subscribe to continue your learning; prices vary, but expect to pay less than $100 a year for full access.
Explore Global Culture
If you want to pretend you’re not trapped in a bus seat for 45 minutes each way, you can visit the world’s great museums virtually through apps like Bloomberg Connects and the Google Arts & Culture app for Android and iOS. Both apps are free.
Bloomberg Connects has more than 200 guides so far, with videos and collections of highlights from the world’s art museums and other cultural sites. These portable museum tours mix video with text and images, and can be downloaded for those times when you don’t have internet access.
Google Arts & Culture has content from more than 3,000 cultural institutions, landmarks and sites from around the world. Also included are travel guides to major world cities, as well as science and history exhibits and culture-based games.
Although TED Talks have become a pop-cultural aside (“Thanks for listening to my TED Talk”), thousands of free lectures on technology, science, design and cultural topics are available for free on the official TED app for Android and iOS. Conversations can be downloaded for offline viewing when you sign up for a free user account.
Study Science
You can also learn the basics of computer coding on your mobile device. Although recently Google stopped its free Grasshopper app for teaching the basics, you’ll find plenty of tutorials and guides for learning the basics of coding on your phone.
The basic plan offered by Sololearn has free, short coding lessons in several computer languages; the pro plan includes interactive demos and other features for $70, billed annually.
The nonprofit Khan Academy has a selection of adult learning courses in computer programming, animation and other subjects. The company has mobile apps and youtube videosbut some content is viewed in a mobile browser.
NASA has a full-featured multimedia app that showcases its space missions, and the agency has created several other free educational mobile apps and games focused on aeronautics, the solar system and more. Links to software can be found by searching the app-store or on the NASA website.
Get a Mental Workout
If you want to take a break from studying to show how much you are already know, there’s no shortage of mobile trivia apps on the app store, including Knowledge Trainer, which tests you with 6,000 questions on a range of topics. The ad-free premium version costs $6 a year.
For additional mental stimulation, such as “brain training” apps. Above or Top which aims to develop cognitive skills through games and stimulating exercises provides another place to focus your attention. A free tier is available, and an annual subscription to either app is less than $40.
Some days may be better than others for micro-learning, but on those days when there is a transit or meeting delay, you can get at least a little extra study time.
