Week 6 Report/Reflection

It's Week 6, halfway through my journey of becoming a role model digital citizen.  This week, I will cover and reflect upon my experience using the tool Evernote.

Coming straight from the horse's mouth (or website in this case), "Evernote makes modern life more manageable by letting you easily collect and find everything that matters. From work notes and to-do lists to recipe collections and travel plans, add everything to Evernote to help you get organized without the effort." 

In summary (and without sounding like an advertisement), it allows you to keep checklists, notes, bookmarks, photos, ebooks, documents, etc. in one account and allows access to them on your computer, tablet and phone via cloud based storage. 

Source: (http://core0.staticworld.net/images/article/2012/10/pcw_primary_evernote_-100007321-large.jpg)



Elephants are known to have an exceptional memory and what an appropriate logo it is for a tool like Evernote.  


Upon creating my account, two things immediately struck me.  First is its likeness to app Google Keep and sharing capabilities with previously introduced tool Diigo. 

Being a big fan of Android and Google services, I find myself using Google Keep very often to make notes and to-do lists.  It was actually only today that I noticed I was able to access the notes I created on my phone on my PC.  After using and installing Evernote on my phone however, I see how superior it is to Keep.  The app has been around for much longer, and as a result, is simply more robust and feature-rich.  Keep lacks the Notebook feature of Evernote (essentially the concept of folders), bookmarking and the e-book feature.  The only thing I found to be missing in Evernote is Keep's integration with Google Drive, which is something I use relatively frequently.  This is not much of a issue however as it is just as accessible on Evernote's site.  A more in-depth comparison between the two can be found in this article from the blog Mashable.  Unless you are an iOS user, Google Keep is a good alternative tool and its integration with Google Drive is likely something you are only going to get with Keep.    

This app gets the seal of approval from me and will integrate it in my ever-growing PLE.  I am thinking it will even replace Diigo as it does everything Diigo can and then some.  Instead of using several different tools, I can just use one to accomplish many of my learning related tasks or just everyday tasks.  I am thinking of using Evernote for more academic purposes while continuing to use Keep more for my everyday life and backing things up to Google Drive.  Its lack of integration with the entire Google ecosystem is the only thing stopping me from dropping Google Keep entirely.     

The key feature of Evernote, in my opinion, is the ability to manage and embed articles.  While my program has very little to do with that kind of work, I can definitely see its usefulness for others. 

While I will not likely be using this for topics like cost accounting, taxation or auditing, the introduction of Evernote could not have come at a better time as we were given a group project in this very class to research digital related topics.  The topic I chose was Digital Security.  Compiling articles, web clippings and handwritten notes will be easier than ever to share with my partner and will be an important tool to ensure the success of the project.      

Valid and online bookmark collectors such as Evernote will help contribute to building knowledge on the topic by offering a more streamlined process in collecting them.  I can access it anywhere I want, given I have an internet capable device on me.  Instead of sending the links to myself via e-mail (the old-fashioned way), I can go above and beyond and annotate and add commentary to the sites or articles I find useful, much like Diigo. 

This week's Feedly contribution comes from the popular bodybuilding.com forum section "The Misc".  In one user's thread is a neat infographic telling people the health benefits milk provides are not as important as North American media tends to portray.  While he has already said the title of his thread is a joke (Got milk? THROW IT AWAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!), he posted it to create discussion amongst whether drinking milk really is beneficial.  Describing it to you would just be a waste of time on my (and your) end, so I'll just provide you with the thread and very well done infographic.  Until someone proves that drinking milk is detrimental to your health, I'll keep on drinking.  I love my dairy products.   

Source: (http://cdn.iwastesomuchtime.com/March-24-2013-19-20-10-GotMilk.gif)

10% lactose tolerant Asian master race crew, checking out.  
 

Week 5 Report/Reflection

What comes after Week 4?  Week 5 of course!

Oh...you thought it was a trick question?

(http://www.1851project.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/PR6.gif)

Week 5 is all about building your Personal Learning Network, more commonly abbreviated and referred to as a PLN.  It was touched upon in my blog earlier but will be further fleshed out this week.  To recap, a PLN is a network consisting of people learners interact and learn from in a PLE.  With enough technology and social networking at our fingertips to have people take it as seriously as a full time job, building an effective PLN is growing increasingly important.

(http://olecommunity.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/personal-learning-network.png)

This week's learning activities call upon the powers of popular social networking site Twitter.  I did make a Twitter account about 2 years ago.  That said, I didn't stay on it and tweet for very long.  I grew bored of it really quickly and following celebrities and their constant self-promotion or some of my friends' extremely mundane statuses every 20 minutes was not really my cup of tea (no offense friends).

(http://img.myconfinedspace.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/This-cool-story-brought-to-you-by-BRO-INCORPORATED.jpg)

I did raise an eyebrow when I found out this would be a tool incorporated in the course to enhance my learning.  I was unable to put the two concepts of learning and Twitter together until I actually tried it and pleasantly surprised me.  Chris Betcher describes it as, "Tiny Bursts of Learning" in his insightful plea for teachers to utilize Twitter.   He goes on to post some very useful articles he acquired off Twitter and it was then I realized that perhaps this site wasn't so useless after all.  Like Reddit (which I no longer frequent), it's all about wading through mountains of annoyances and finding the right subreddit/person that piques your interest.

After making a new account with a professional name and choosing who I followed much more carefully, the tweets I got were far less annoying.  It was either a neat image, an interesting perspective or article, or great food for thought.  Like Betcher said, just skimming your Twitter for ten minutes can fill your head with great ideas and information, much like the RSS feed we explored in Week 3.  After my week spent on Twitter, I can say now that it definitely can be just as an effective learning tool as blogs, textbooks or newpapers.  Acquiring learning skills from professionals as well as my fellow ADED 1P32 classmates can be a great experience in my journey of self-improvement.  I look forward to including it in my PLE, likely where I placed Facebook.   Feel free to follow me @MarkAChong as I continue to make sense of being a digital citizen.

This week, it dawned upon me that if I were to use Twitter, I would want to post things that reflect me as someone who is interesting and learns things on a frequent basis.  Becoming what I hate on Twitter is the last thing I want to become (ie. the tweets of getting out of bed, how you got a papercut, the tasty water you just had, and other tweets that make you say cool story bro).  Becoming a digital citizen, it is important that others see you as someone not only good and polite, but also interesting so you can build your digital network.  Things are becoming digital at an alarming rate and eventually it may be our gateway to everything.  Becoming digitally literate is becoming more important than ever and using Twitter is a great tool for not only speaking your mind, but educating others around you and keeping a positive reputation.

As for this week's Feedly contribution, it has to do with the 5 senses, particularly hearing and sight.  In the article, scientists did a study on adult mice and kept them in darkness for a week.  Researchers then monitored activity in their brain while mice listened to different tones with varying pitches and volumes.  Mice kept in the dark had more neuron activity to both changes in pitch and volume.  The effects persisted for weeks even after the mice were exposed to light again.  This was surprising because often when born blind, people have sharpened senses, particularly hearing.  If by any instance you become blind after early childhood, your senses generally do not sharpen as neuron activity connecting your brain to your senses has already completed by that time and cannot be rewired, unlike an infant.  To summarize, a lack of input in the visual cortex temporarily sharpens the auditory cortex for weeks even after sensory development has completed.

Catch you all later in Week 6.

Week 4 Report/Reflection

Hello readers.  It's Week 4 and you know what that means.  More reflection on internet learning tools.

This week's instalment focuses on becoming internet content curators.  This is the compiling, organization, maintenance and archiving of relevant content pertaining to a specific field of interest.  The difference between any average curator and a great one is explained by Gianluca Fiorelli's blog post named "Content curation: definition and generation".  For some cliffs:

1. Finding the best content: A great curator knows who his target audience is and finds not only relevant but material that will sit well with the readers.
2. Adding value: It's one thing to just provide the link, but the curator that goes above and beyond will add commentary to the content that will add value to the provided work.
3. Crediting: this is kind of self-explanatory

(Source: http://cms.searchenginewatch.com/IMG/234/238234/fire-hydrant-filter-failure.jpg?1351611413) 

There's a lot of information on the internet.  Some great.  Some troll attempts.  Looking up what the best exercise for your posterior deltoids can be like opening a closet full of skittles.  Information overload if you will.  If you want the best information quick or are just really gullible and want to know what sources you can trust, finding the right curator can save you a lot of time.  By becoming one yourself, you can be that go-to person.

In this week's ADED session, we were required to create an account on a cloud based bookmarking tool.  I chose Diigo.  I used this video provided by my instructor to help me acquaint myself with the service:

Initially I thought this was going to be a near useless service as recent versions of Google Chrome have incorporated the importing of your bookmarks with your gmail account.  I was proven wrong as the Diigo Chrome tool not only lets you saves your bookmarks, but allows to you annotate and screenshot portions of pages.  These additional tools are perhaps why many people still use Diigo.

We were instructed to look at other web curating tools and I only had time this week to look at one, which was Jog The Web.  What it essentially does is it allows you to create a package using various websites and allows you to annotate and edit the sites in one package.  Personally, I think it is a tool more suited for teachers looking to present information in an easy way to their (likely elementary school) students in a near foolproof manner.  If I were to use it, it would be in a similar fashion to the Diigo tool but because Diigo has everything I need and is a tad more efficient and convenient, it will be unlikely.

That said, Diigo will be a great addition to my ever expanding PLE.  As for where it will be placed, it is going to go into my organizing/sharing content section.  I envision using Diigo being a great tool in group projects.  The annotation tool is key and sharing information is even easier than copy and pasting on a google doc.  If more subjects in school were taught with more free online resources, I think my usage of the tool would be quite heavy as well.  

Last week, we were required to set up an RSS feed, which I can say I have been using more recently than usual.  It provides me with things that pique my interest more than it ever has merely because my understanding of the tool has greatly increased.  That said, so far, it hasn't really contributed to my learning pertaining to my university major.  Approaching the twilight years of my university life, advanced topics covered in accounting are difficult to find on the web.  It has however definitely contributed to my knowledge of current events and other odd news that I find interesting.  

As for my weekly Feedly contribution, this week it is the decline of popular teenage fashion retailer sales.  From the NY Times, it highlights how the unemployment rate in teens is at an all-time high, online shopping has become more popular, faster trends and more money spent on technology, among other things contributing to why stores like Abercrombie and Fitch, American Eagle and Aeropostale are running into problems selling clothes these days.  Without further ado, the link is here.    

Peace out bye.