What’s up my compadre nayshon! I missed you guys this week, hope you missed me too and are excited about my final blog post! When I first enrolled in this course one of my biggest problems was finding a way to prioritize my work and not procrastinate. Though over the course of this semester I have picked up some great knowledge on how to combat these vices. Going forward, I will be mapping out each week at the beginning of the week and giving each task on my agenda a specific time and time period to complete it within. I have found throughout this course that this has made me much more proactive and improved my time management skills and I can’t wait to use it for the future. From beginning to end I would say I drastically changed my time management and prioritization habits exponentially. My most meaningful experience in this course was the week that I sat down at the week’s end and looked back to see that I finished every itemized task I created for myself the weak prior. This course has taught me that I have all the tools necessary to complete tasks to the best of my ability, I just don’t always put them to work. This goes for both online and tangible resources at my availability and my own mental work ethic and attitude towards getting things done. Overall this semester truly helped me hone my study skills and overall productivity. One last tip I will leave you guys with is to never be afraid to ask for help. Enrolling in this class was my way of asking for help and I am so glad I did. If you never ask for help you will continue to run into the same problems semester after semester and create unneeded stress that will ultimately make things even worse. It is never too late to ask either, if you ever need help seek it out! Do not be afraid to accept guidance and advice, it will ultimately back you a better learner and even a better person. That is all I have for you this week compadre nayshon, it has been an awesome semester talking with you guys. I hope you all took away as much as I did. Have a great summer!

-Zach Dorner

Upon the completion of the lesson in module 6. It is clear that there is a lot to writing that I need to start applying to my daily assignments in all of my classes. More specifically, I’ve been approaching research papers totally wrong.

Most importantly I always approached a research paper by simply presenting the most valid information on a certain topic of interest. I never took my own angle on the topic and built an argument based off of that opinion. What really caught my attention is what Prensky said on slide 10: “Research requires a critical look at the quality of the information you are finding rather than simply finding information that fits a particular topic”. This quote really captivated me for a few reasons. First off, this quote perfectly depicts what “research” is. It broadly encompasses the most important part of research.

All in all, the most important thing that I learned from this lesson is that a research paper will never be credible or up to par if the sources you go the information from isn’t. That may seem obvious, but too often I find myself using the information from the first link that I find. To future college students, I would recommend creating some sort of algorithm to follow for every website you want to extract information from. For instance, ask yourself when the website was created? Who’s the author? Is the info biased? And so on.

Hey compadre nayshon, this weeks module had some very valuable information in it, that am I happy to have learned and to be able to share with you. The biggest thing I personally took away from this section was the benefit of using effective study tools. I am a very visual learner, so being introduced to this awesome list of resources such as infographics, timelines, animations, mind maps, etc. is going to be very helpful for me. It makes it much easier to visually organize your material to study it, if that is your preferred way of learning.

One area touched on in this module that I find I already participate in during my studies is summarizing after I read. I love to go over all the side notes I have taken on what I have read to really give it a permanent spot in my memory.

I could work more on getting ready before reading though, I have a bad habit of not clearing my environment completely of distractions before beginning to read and it always proves to be counterproductive. I could also do better at making sure what I am reading is applicable and bona fide.

One tip I would like to leave for any of my compadre nayshon out there reading this that are working towards more effective study habits, would be to spend some time evaluating your study sessions and pinpointing what the best way you personally learn is. As I mentioned earlier, I am a visual learner so using things such as infographics and timelines are very effective study tools for me, but everyone is different and you need to find what’s best for you!

Hello compadre nayshon!!

Throughout this module, we learned about the problem that plagues us all: procrastination.  We have all been faced with procrastination in our lives, and it seems difficult to fix.  Putting off large assignments makes it seem like there is not enough time after you have ineffectively managed your time.   Time management is a crucial skill that could massively boost your grades and productivity if utilized in the correct manner.  One way that could make managing your time easier would be to make a time log of your days.  This will allow you to record the time you spend doing sleeping, working, doing homework, or relaxing.  Keeping these logs for the future will allow you to go back and analyze a week where you felt you had more work than time to do that work.  This analysis will allow you to be aware and try to prevent making this mistake in the future.  Another effective time management tool is a calendar.  If you make a calendar listing all the due dates of your assignments along with your class and work times, you will have an easily accessible to-do list for the week.  If you combine this calendar with your time log, you can easily plan certain times for all the things you need to do, making it much easier to work on a project throughout the week instead of trying to do the entire project at the last second.  This year, I began to make a weekly calendar with all of my classes and due date assignments.  This has really boosted my productivity and lowered the stress over last-minute assignments.  I could begin to make a time sheet along with my calendar to further breakdown my free time and more effectively plan my weeks.  This will enable me to space out long papers and big projects, working on them periodically over time instead of at the last minute.  Not only will these methods make you less stressed, but they will also help you create higher quality work and assignments.  Have a great week compadre nayshon! I will be back in 7 days with more tips for your elearning habits.

What’s up compadre nayshon!

I have decided that over the course of this blog, I will refer to you students as my compadre nayshon. I decided to write this blog because I have been learning a lot of very valuable knowledge in my online learning strategies and skills class that I want to pass on to my nayshon of compadres!

To start things off, this week in my course I learned some very important information about netiquette, also known as your personal etiquette on the web. If you want to be in my nayshon of compadres, you have play in accordance to some simple rules when using the web in order to keep a positive netiquette. The most important rule I learned for keeping a positive netiquette is how to write a positive academic email. This isn’t an informal email to someone in your nayshon of compadres. This is an email for when you are interacting with TAs, professors, or professionals. Three important parts to writing an academic email is to proofread, write in complete sentences, and to add in that you may have already checked your syllabus for this particular question you are seeking an answer for.

One practice I think I already have put into place well is relevant to discussion posts. One of the 6 tips for writing an out of this world, off the charts, compadre nayshon worthy discussion post is to prepare your response in a text editor before you post. I usually put mine in Microsoft Word since I am comfortable with the program. This way you can prevent spelling and grammar mistakes in your discussions online.

Something I want to practice more in the future also is relevant to discussion posts. Another one of the 6 tips was to leave your compadres wanting more. I don’t know if I necessarily do the best job of this, sometimes I get lazy once I have got my main point across and have a lackluster conclusion. In the future I am going to work on really wrapping up my discussion posts in a powerful fashion and leaving my nayshon of compadres on the edge of their seat.

Overall, I think the biggest advice I can give to my compadre nayshon is to PROOF READ YOUR WORK. This is so important to keeping a positive netiquette and a professional image around yourself, yet so many people fail to do so. It doesn’t take as long as you may think and can keep you from looking foolish in an area you could have avoided.

For now compadre nayshon, I will be signing off, but I will be back next week with some more educational nectar for your voluptuous cerebellums.