Once school lets out for the summer, many parents begin to fret about whether or not their children will forget everything they’ve learned during the school year. Have no fear! The exploding trend of online education is offering up some tremendous resources to keep the minds of the younger set — and even the older set — engaged and active all summer.Free online video lessons for secondary school and college studentsTED is a free app for both iPad and iPhone that is the brainchild of the non-profit organisation by the same name.The acronym for ‘Technology, Education, Design,’ TED hosts several annual conferences on ideas and has amassed a wealth of video from some of the world’s top thinkers. The Ted-Ed project, launched just three months ago, features an online collection of free video lessons designed to bring insights from some of the world’s best educators into any classroom — or home — that has an internet connection.“Right now there’s a teacher somewhere out there delivering a mind-altering lesson, and the frustrating thing is, it only reaches the students in that class,” said TED-Ed project director Logan Smalley.Each lesson is just six minutes long, and all use high-quality production, with professional animation and graphics. The educational website that goes with this resource is http://ed.ted.com and features intriguing series with titles like ‘Questions No One (Yet) Knows the Answers To’ and ‘The Way We Think.’If you are an adult reading this, I know what you are thinking. You want to check it out, of course — it all sounds so inspiring. Visit the other TED site, www.ted.com, where you can find more than 1,100 online videos of some of the world’s top minds, captured while speaking at the TED conferences, anyone from Steve Jobs to Bill Clinton.Khan AcademyThe Khan Academy was founded by noted Bangladeshi-American educator, Salman Khan, a graduate of both Harvard Business School and MIT, and named this year by TIME Magazine as “one of the top 100 most influential people in the world”. The mission of Khan’s not-for-profit organisation is “to provide a free, world-class education to anyone, anywhere.”Said to be the most-widely-used educational video repository on the internet, the Khan Academy is open to all. Explore the website for resources, including more than 3,200 tutorials in video format, on a range of subjects from math and science to finance and history, and covering all grade levels. Visit www.khanacademy.org to get started exploring.The Khan Academy recently launched a free iPad application you can download at iTunes. The app offers more than 2,700 free videos. Users earn badges as rewards, with some students spending hours watching physics videos just to get the badge. This app gives you the ability to access content without an internet connection, great if you are on the go this summer.BrainPOPFree for educators, this subscription-based site offers some excellent resources and has a “test drive” option that lets you try before you buy. Plans go for under $10 a month, but may save you money on tutoring services. BrainPOP gives families access to hundreds of animated movies, quizzes, games, high-interest reading material, and activities. The site’s content is all aligned to US academic standards. There are several options: BraipPOP; BrainPOP Jr.; BrainPOP Espanol; and BrainPOP ESL (English as a Second Language). All include topics that span science, social studies, English, math, engineering & technology, health, arts and music. Find out more at www.BrainPop.comAmazing science website from NASALeave it to a large, well-funded organisation like NASA (the US’s National Aeronautics and Space Agency), to deliver some very compelling online resources that help children take a natural interest in science and technology. NASA is serious about its role as an educational entity, and at www.nasa.gov, there’s a vast Students section with content for a range of different grade levels, as well as NASA’s Kids’ Club, for the under-5 set. Children can join the conversation about the future exploration of Mars, or view videos from NASA’s new space station page. The NASA Kids’ Club has an interactive section where children can learn about space and find out what it’s like to be an astronaut. Buzz Lightyear even shows up in one game where the children are asked to help him prepare for an upcoming space trip. The site is truly loaded and it’s all free.Terry Roberson, is the general manager of Bermuda CableVision