Final Post

During this course I have learned a lot about online tools and resources. There are various websites that help students manage their time, create better study habits and stay organized. I’ve learned that resources like quizlet and study stack can help students when studying by allowing them to create flashcards and use other user’s flashcards as well. Study stack also has interactive games to help students study and I think this is a great feature because it will keep users interested in the subject they are trying to learn.  I can use both of these sites in the future to help me prepare for tests and quizzes. I also learned how to use sites like Google Docs and Google Calendar the correct way so that I could maximize their utility. I did know about these sites before this class, but seeing how I can use them to track how I use my time and create tasks to be completed showed me just how useful these sites can be. I will certainly be using these in the future when I go to graduate school.

I have learned several things about myself while taking this course. The first thing that I learned is that I am a procrastinator. After taking the time management quizzes, I realized that I tend to put off important tasks and wait until the last minute to do papers and projects. Luckily, I think I am improving on this ever since I realized how bad my problem was. I try to complete tasks ahead of time now in case I run into any problems. I also learned that I can work with technology a lot better than I thought I could. I would have never used websites to help me stay organized or study in the past because I thought it was better to use more traditional methods. I wouldn’t even use my computer to take notes in class. I now feel a lot more comfortable with using online tools and see how beneficial they really are.

I think my most meaningful experience in this course would be learning how to communicate with my peers better. I am usually fairly shy and reserved, so I try to avoid talking to or messaging my classmates. I think that by creating a blog for my peers to read and having to comment on their discussion posts helped me become more comfortable with this though. I was always afraid that I would be criticized for my thoughts, but I found that the other student’s were actually quite supportive and we were all able to learn a lot from each other. I am hoping that after this class I will be able to continue to reach out to my fellow peers and instructors because I truly believe that it helped me be more successful in the course.

Finally, I will apply what I have learned in this course by continuing to use the resources that were taught to me. I want to be more organized in graduate school and have better study habits so I would like to use a lot of the websites and online tools that we discussed and used in this class. I will take what I learned about audio tools, researching for papers, writing emails the correct way, communicating with my instructor and peers and staying organized with me to graduate school since all of these are valuable things to understand. By continuing to use sites such as Google Calendar and Study Stack, I think I will be able to accomplish more than I thought I could. Hopefully, I will keep these skills for a long time and can teach them to other who are entering or in college.