Three takeaways of ESLTECH 2011

  1. As an online student, we should know how to manage our time. Different from the other courses, students will not be forced to take classes and absorb new knowledge at a certain time. Therefore, it is important for students to be good time-manager so that they can successfully complete all their tasks on time. As for me, I will establish a schedule to list what I need to do in a week and in a day respectively, which allows me to track the process of what I need to do in a week and know how to plan my next day schedule.

2. Collaboration is also important for online students. Different from other courses which allow students to communicate directly with other, online students require to utilize other tools, such as discussion board, Gmail, and GroupMe, to contact their group members.  To complete a group assignment, there are several steps that require students to do. 1. Getting to know group members. 2. Understanding the assignment before it starts. 3. Defining the components of the project. 4. Defining roles and responsibilities. 5. The role of the project manager. 6. Assessing group experience.

3. It important for students to know how to find credible resources. There is a 5W model that allows students to easily determine whether the source they find is credible or note. 1. Who: is the author credentials? 2. When: when is the article published? Is the article still relevant? 3.What: it the content in this article bias or not? 4.Why: the purpose of the author to write this article. 5. Where: is this article been recognized by others as important or useful?

Technology

One of the most useful technologies I learned from this course is called Trello, a time-management application. There are many different functions in this app and people can utilize it in their ways. For me, I use it as a list to check my tasks.  There are several steps for me to create a useful list in Trello. I always created a board for tasks for the whole week. When I was creating this, I first considered what homework I must complete in this week and make the first column to type all of them in there. Secondly, I created the second column for what I should complete today (including study work and daily work) and switched the assignments I need to complete today from the first column. Thirdly, I created Doing and Done columns. When I start to do or complete a task, I will switch them from the second column to the corresponding columns, which allows me to track the process of the tasks I need to do this week.

There are two features of Trello that I think are useful. One is color labels, the other one is the setting of the due day. Different color labels allow me to separate my classes and life work and the setting of the due day can notice me which tasks I should complete first. Both of them highly improve my efficiency

This link allows us to go to the website of Trello: https://trello.com

Note-Taking strategies

Note-taking is important for college students. For students who learn more about note-taking, they can absorb more than others who do not. In this post, I will introduce several strategies that can improve the skill of note-taking.

The first one is the utilization of abbreviations. It allows students to write down more information with the use of fewer letters. There are several common types of abbreviations, including acronyms, first letters, shortened words, words with reduced vowels, and symbols as abbreviations.  I prefer to use shortened words and symbols as abbreviations since these two kinds of abbreviations are not only can save my time to take more notes during the class but are easier for me to identify words I write when I rewrite them later.

The second one is the technology to take notes, Notability.  I prefer to use this application than many other else is because it has various and useful functions for me to manage my notes. For each course, I created a specific column and color so that it is easier for me to identify each of them. When I created a new note, I would assign them to the respective course column. Moreover, it not only allows me to create notes but can edit notes in many ways. For example, I can use different highlight pens or change the color of characters to emphasize the important information in the note. Also, I can insert any pictures and videos I want so that my notes can become more active. Overall, Notability make my note-taking become more effectively! The link below might help you understand Notability.

https://www.gingerlabs.com