Week 7: Google Docs and Collaborative Work

Hello Bloggers!

            Everyone do not worry I am back from reading week and ready to share my experience with you this week. First, I hope that every experienced a nice relaxing week off, and not too much stress. If you are feeling stressed I hope this link I am going to share will help.  This week I would like to share something a little bit different from my Feedly account. I will be sharing one of my favorite recipes from Emily Skye’s Blog. The recipe is for flourless banana pancakes, which are so tasty. These are a very yummy treat for yourself, but still healthy and we all know that can be hard to find. I bet we all can treat ourselves after the stress of midterms and papers being due this week. 

            This week I will be discussing my journey of using the online tool of Google Docs through Google. I am using this tool to work on my collaborative project with my fellow classmates on digital communication. I have to mention that collaborative work is a very helpful tool, as it aids many students with writing publicly (Institute for Writing& Rhetoric, 2013). Also, gives the students the chance to work with each other and learn off of one another, since two minds are better than one! Collaborative work is also beneficial for students as it allows the work to be peer reviewed by others to ensure the writing is readable to the general public (Institute for Writing & Rhetoric, 2013). So, if you are thinking about doing collaborative working Google Docs is the best tool to use.

            Google Docs is a tool that aids in collaboration with other people through creating and synthesizing documents.  The features of Google Docs is the ability to create documents, PowerPoint, or spreadsheet, thus it has multiple functions. The analogy I will compare Google Docs to is the idea of having Pages, Numbers, and Keynote all on website. I will be using Google Docs for many of different tasks throughout my education career and professional career of being a teacher. Here is a few example of what I will be using Google Docs for:

Young Up Stars (2012) [Online Photo]
 Retrieved from 
http://www.youngupstarts.com/2012/04/12/52-great-google-docs-secrets-for-students/

• Group Projects 

• Group Papers 

• Assignments 

• Notes 

• Sharing knowledge 

• Connect with Peers 

• PowerPoints   

      Therefore, this tool is a very useful for both the student and professor because you are able to share work and collaborate together. This tool will be very useful if you and your group member live far away or a group member is sick, they are still able communicate with each other via the web, rather than in person. Therefore, this tool does not just help you with creating the product, but it helps you to connect to build the product.

I love Google Docs it is a live saver! It is a great tool that I will be adding to my Personal Learning Environment. I will be adding this tool under organizational, collaboration and productivity, since it is a very multipurpose tool. WOW does my PLE just keeps growing each and every week!

Thank you for reading my blog this week! 

Week 6 -- Evernote

Hello Everyone,

            Before I get started with my blog post I felt the need to share this link with everyone this week. The link is entitled 10 Simple Hacks to Land Better Grades, this link gives you tips on how to do better in college or university. I felt this tips would be helpful for all of us being midterm time. I hope this tip will help in some sort of way for midterms. If anyone has any other tips to do better in school, please leave some comments.  I hope everyone enjoyed their break and study hard for their midterms.

https://dev.evernote.com/accelerator/

This week topic is on Evernote the digital workspace and the entire great feature it has to offer. For my fellow bloggers who have never heard of Evernote, I believe that it is a great online tool to use for students. Personally, I have used Evernote many of time previously to this week, as this tools allows you collect all of your ideas in one place. Evernote allows you to put many different forms of information in one space (Hamilton, 2010). With Evernote you are able to create your own notes, add photos, web clippings, or full websites. After you add the information you want you are able to create different notebooks for different ideas or projects.  This tool allows you to hold as much information as you want, organizes the way you want, and you can even share your notebooks with others (Hamilton, 2010). One of my favorite features with this tool is the ability to tag key words in your notes, thus making it easier to search the note later on.

            I will be adding this tool to my Personal Learning Environment and Personal Learning Network because I will be using it very often.  I feel that the tool has many purposes, which means I can use for many different tasks. I will be adding this Personal Learning Environment under organizational, socialization, productivity and collaborate. The reason this tool fits into so many different categories is because it is multipurpose. It fits under the organizational category is because you are able to place all your information into different notebooks and tabs. You are able to choose if the note are order by the date or the name, being organized is very important when doing assignments. The reason it could be under socialization and collaborate is because you can share your notebook with other people, like classmates. This tool can also be under productivity because you can create projects, just like I am doing for my ADED 1P32 research project. Man is my PLE every building these past for weeks, I love it !

I love this tool because you are able to organize and I enjoy being organized, since it is so important to be organized as a university student. I will be using this tool in my university career and also future professional career as an educator. I will be using this tool for:

•      Note taking
•       Projects
•       To do list
•       Schedules
•       Lesson plans
•      Activity idea

What will everyone else being using Evernote for ? 

Thank you for reading!

Week 5: Twitter and PLN's

So this week I am posting about something a little different from previous week, it is link that caught my eye on my Feedly feed since it is getting close to midterm season. I know we are probably just wishing for a miracle to happen to be able to remember everything in time for those stressful exams. Well this post entitled The Tasty Drink That Could Help Boost Memory andThinking Skills talks about one Canadian favorite winter drink as being a miracle drink. This link is an interesting read, but now the question is do you believe it, and will you try this tasty drink when studying these upcoming weeks for midterms. I think I will, as there is no harm in trying (plus, you get great drink out of the deal!)

Twitter 

The new tool on the Internet of the week is caller Twitter, we all know this is not a new tool, but are we all using this tool to its full potential. This week I have learned that Twitter can be used to share an idea or ask your followers questions. Many young user use Twitter to tweet what they are doing or eating, but Twitter can be used as self-promoting tool. I realize this week you are able to discuss information with your followers in a professional manner. Hashtags are an interesting feature on Twitter, which allows you search a keyword on certain idea or topic and it will locate other posts on that topic that used those same keywords or hashtags. Another feature that Twitter has which allows you to collaborate in more directly is direct messaging; you can also collaborate with others by responding to their tweets and engaging in conversation. All you students and teachers out their need to understand how useful twitter can be for educational activities, you are able to communicate with millions of people.  Twitter also fits into anyone Personal Learning Network (PLN), which is connected with the RSS Feed, which includes many of articles, websites, and blogs that are a part of ones PLN. It is known that everyone and anyone who you interact with is apart of your PLN. Many educators use PLN to collaborate with other educators on how to structure their classroom, lesson plans or activities (Klingensmith, 2009). An example of another tool that may be apart of ones PLN is Pinterest.

Twitter and a Personal Learning Network both contribute to become a digital citizen and knowledge because I am able to connect with others in the technology world. Being able to connects allows me learn how be social and cooperative with other in a different type of setting.  With this two tools I am able to adapt and expand my ideas my making them better, with the ability to share my opinion and read others. Therefore, I will be adding Twitter to my PLE diagram under socialization and collaboration, since that is the whole purpose of Twitter.

Hope you enjoy the read, have a happy time blogging J

Weekly Report & Reflection Blog Post #4 (Bookmarking)

     Before I get into my blog I would like to share with one of my readings I found on my RSS Feed tool. I came across this reading and feel that has connected with my learning.  The reading was a blog post entitled organize your homework. The reason I am sharing this page is face not everyone strong suit is staying organized, and it one of my pet peeves when I see people binders and they are a mess. This page gives you tips on how to stay organized using the web tool called evernote.

  

http://www.smashinghub.com/

  The concept of bookmarking is a very important tool to use when you have a lot of different websites that you visit on a daily basis. The tool that I have been using this week for bookmarking is Diigo. This tool has helped me to organize my most used website into different types of categories all on one page. Examples of some of my categories are Essay Help, Education, Workout and many others. The best part of Diigo is that if you sign in to a different computer or device you are able to still have your most visited website at your hands. But, remember this idea of bookmarking is different then RSS Feeds because bookmarking just stores your website for you on page, as compared to an RSS feeds gives your favourite websites updates. However, with the Diigo you able to highlight important information, sticky note the websites, and even screenshot the information.

    Diigo is going to be a very useful tool for my education, since when in University you have to do a lot of different research on vary topic making it confusing later which websites was for which topic. But with the handy tool Diigo you will be able neatly organize each website on page under certain categories. Also, if you do not finish that 20 pages reading (lets all be realistic who finish the reading in one go) with Diigo there is a feature that lets you press read later to remind you that you still need to read the website/ article. Another helpful feature for my education on Diigo is the ability to highlight right on the website, which eliminates be writing it down somewhere else. I feel that the best feature of Diigo is that everything is neatly organized on one site.

    Well bookmarking it is important to use the TRASH METHOD or INTERNET DETECTIVE Model to ensure that you have a valid and reliable source. Since we all know that everything we read online is not always correct. Therefore, valid and reliable sources are important to help contribute to your building knowledge is because you know that the information that you are reading is accurate and not false. Thus, creating knowledge that is accurate that is based of evidences.

https://www.haikudeck.com/

   
    For me the concept of Bookmarking would be categorized as an organizational tool for my Personal Learning Environment, but remember everyone is different when it comes to learning. I personally would add this tool to my PLE diagram as; I will be using this tool for the rest of education career (actually for the rest of my life). I will be using this tool to ensure that I stay organized and all of my websites are read, noted and properly stored.

    So far through out this course, the ability to partake in this weekly session, I have discovered many new tools to use on the web. I am also, learning how to use this new web tools and the benefits and responsibilities that come with them. Thus, this is allowing me to become more of digital citizen, as well as gaining digital literacy.

Week 3: RSS Feeds

          So what is the RSS feed tool? RSS feeds is known as a technology that helps you to keep your favourite website organized and notified when there is an update on there feed. It is known as a form of bookmarking from the old days (oh how technology just keeps changing, so quickly). The RSS feed does not have all the problems that bookmarking had, as RSS feeds put the website into categories for you, which makes it a lot easier to find what we are looking for (Rowse, 2010). This makes become a digital citizen a lot easier!

http://www.vitaship.com/

It is just the start of 2016; therefore it is the start for a new and improved you. I am here to help you with your workout habits, as many of you say you do not have the time to go to the gym or do not know to eat healthy, well here is the blog for you The Lazy Girl Fitness. This blog contains all of the best recipes for you, and they are not gross healthy recipes either, which makes it a lot easier to keep up with. If you are looking to try a great protein recipe this is the place to look. This blog was a lifesaver for me, as I learned how to make cookies, but just with less sugar and fat, since I want to watch the amount of sugar I am eating but it is so hard when I love sweets. So if you are a sweets lover like me, but want to watch your figure I suggest give this blog a look through.

http://s3.feedly.com/img/feedly-512.png

     RSS feeds are a very useful tool to manage your online knowledge, RSS feeds are assisting to the contribute to my work in building my digital literacy by showing me how to use different online tools such as Feedly, which is RSS feeds tool.  The independence of freely being able to explore and choice your feeds is building my digital responsibility needed to have a positive digital footprint. There are many positive aspect when looking at technology, The RSS taught me that it is digital citizenship is important because it teaches you communication, responsibility, and collaboration. Therefore, to be a digital citizenship you have to focus on the positives that the online world can you, create a digital footprint (Ribble, 2015).

     What kind of tool would say you a RSS feed is for your personal learning environment? I would personally place the RSS feed into both an organizational tool and a socializing tool for my PLE. The reason it is an organizational tool is because it puts all of your websites in categorizes, keeping all of the updates organized. The reason it is also a socialization tools is because when on others blogs you are able to interact with other by communicating back and forth with comments. As the comments gives the blog more meaning.

       Do not forget everyone it is important to become a digital citizen, so join and start using the technology and tools provided to become a digital citizen.