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Study environment

When it comes to getting down to study I believe that the environment that surrounds you is a very important piece to learning. Every time I study I need to be in a quiet secluded space to really capture all of my work. I get distracted easily and need my surroundings to be quiet. This is a personal preference and some people study better with many things and people moving around them while they get their work done. For example, a coffee shop would be ideal because they have many new customers walking in and out. While others may need to listen to music while studying, for me personally I can’t have music playing because my thoughts will get confused in my head.

For productivity reasons for me personally I study best in my room with a candle lit and where my desk has nothing on it but my laptop and notebook. This gives me a clean space to work with and a calm space so I do not get overwhelmed. Like I said this is a completely personal choice and you have to figure out what works best for you whether that be quiet and secluded or in a busy environment with music on.

There is a link listed below that can be helpful for those trying to figure out their perfect study environment.

5 Strategies for Creating a Good Study Environment

It has many options and you can ask yourself questions while reading it to figure out your niche.

Note taking technology

This has been one of my biggest struggles throughout my college experience. In high school, I took most of my notes on pen and paper and it worked out for me. When I got to college I tried this method and it just was not working for me and I got very behind and frustrated. I would miss a lot of notes because my hand was not writing fast enough. I then started to write my notes in a google doc and keep track of them that way, this was an okay method for me for a few classes. I then did not like how I could not create different folders to organize better so I then started using One Note. This application is very useful and efficient for note-taking. You can create multiples notebooks with different folders to better organize each class you take notes for. I absolutely love how versatile this application is because you can use it on an iPad to draw on powerpoints, you can use it on your phone and also sync it to your computer. This is my all-time favorite technology to take notes on.

One other technology that I learned from this class is MindMup. This online website allows you to create roadmaps to your class notes or thoughts. I love this because I am a visual learner and like to see my work being branched out in some sort of flow chart. I allow me to see where ideas are coming from and where they are going. It is very helpful in terms of mapping out thoughts to see it as a whole from far away. The link to the website is below.

https://www.mindmup.com/

My experience with Online Learning

My experience with online learning has been mostly positive. I would say that taking a few online courses I find myself getting a lot better and time management and being self-motivating. Some difficulties that arose in a few of my online courses would be the structure of how it was set up. The online course was unorganized and I found it hard for me as the student to navigate it without physical instructions of a professor in front of me. I would have to email the professor to gain a clear understanding of what the assignment was and sometimes that was frustrating because there was a deadline and I would have to hurry up and finish the assignment. One way that helped me through this is looking at assignments further in advance to determine if I needed further clarification.

This class has helped me and is very neatly organized on a road map for each module. I found this class to be very useful if this is your first time taking an online course. It gives you expectations and new tools to use to make your online experience better. One thing that was very important to me that I took away from this class is realizing what your values and expectations are when enrolling in an online class. This has to deal with what kind of learner you are. You need to be motivated and set goals for your online courses because they are not much different learning wise than an in-person class.