7 valuable skills you can learn FREE this summer

What if learning something amazing and boosting your employability, was as easy as killing some time on the internet? Well, it can be..

• 7 valuable skills you can learn FREE this summerWhat if learning something amazing and boosting your employability, was as easy as killing some time on the internet? Well, it can be..

You've got - or nearly got - the degree, you've got the communication skills and you know how to do all the basic IT stuff. You see a job that you're pretty much perfect for, except for one thing: "must have knowledge of CSS, SEO and Photoshop". Argh. They haven't covered this in lectures.

Beyond employment, new skills are worth having in life regardless - they can open up so many experiences and opportunities and also provide incredible amounts of personal satisfaction.

Well the good news is it turns out the internet isn't just for Facebook and videos of animals falling off things - you can learn a load of stuff on there. For free. So if you've got some spare time over the summer, why not tick a few things off the"stuff you'd like to be good at" list?

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1. Photoshop

Knowledge of image editing software is useful even if you're not particularly arty. Sitepoint has a good article to get you started with the Photoshop basics - perfect if you're a total and utter newbie. Six Revisions provides an extensive list of Photoshop tutorials for you to choose from, according to your current skill level. Digital Arts is another easy-to-navigate site that has tutorials for lots of image editing software, not just Photoshop.

2. HTML & CSS

W3schools has all the tutorials you could wish for when it comes to HTML, CSS and Javascript, but there's quite a bit to trawl through. A good place to start to master the basics of HTML is here. Once you've mastered HTML, give CSS a shot. CSS Tutorial explains it clearly, and in a non-patronising way - a bit of a rarity in the world of online tutorials. Nettutsplus.com also has tutorials on all things web-related - you may have to click through for a while to find the ones for beginners, but it's definitely worth a browse.

3. SEO

With the rise of social media as a promotional tool, search engine optimization isn't as relevant as it was. But a number of jobs still require knowledge of it, so get clued up. Moz.com has a free guide to SEO that's easy to follow and looks nice too - what more could you ask for? You can also get ahead of the game by knowing your SMO (social media optimization) - check out Mashable's article on it. There's a collection of tutorials atblog.hubspot.com that focus on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn.

4. Video & audio editing

There's a range of free software you can download and play around with - try one, some or all of these for video, and these for audio. Vimeo has Video School 101, which covers the basics of shooting and editing, and PC Advisorhas a good step by step guide to using Audacity.

5. Learn a new language

Learning a new language in a couple of months may not be feasible, but if you're heading off to a country where you can't even mumble a greeting this summer, and you don't want to come across as an ignorant English tourist, there's loads of free online resources that can help. "Duolingo" is a free app that you can use to learn French, Spanish, German, Portuguese and Italian. There's also Livemocha, an online language-learning community, and free language courses available on iTunes.

6. Photography

Whether you just want to take envy-inspiring snaps of your dinner, or you have a blog or website you want to show off on, learning some photography skills is almost instantly rewarding. And a great excuse to head somewhere pretty.Photo.tutsplus.com has 100 photography tutorials for beginners and pros. You don't need a camera worth thousands, either - Lifehacker has some basics you can learn to get the most from your digital camera.

7. How to be a kitchen guru

You probably know how to make enough dishes for your own survival. But why not use the summer to build on that? By September, you could be the go-to guy or girl for dinner parties. Or amazing cakes (only weird people hate cake). Being able to impress people with your cooking will stand you in good stead at all times in life. Trust us. Delia Online is a great place to start, and BBC Good Food has a good mixture of techniques and recipes.

But the best student cooking training manual of all? Why studentbeans.com's very own Ultimate Student Cookbook. It teaches you the basics and moves things on from there, to give you a true grounding in taste and technique, setting you up for a lifetime of cooking and eating amazing food. It's also got all the recipes you could need - especially picked and designed for student life, by us in collaboration with leading food technician Rob Allison (who helps create recipes for Heston, Mr Jamie Oliver - all the big boys. It's brand new, coming in August and you can pre-order it here.