Collaborative Work Using Google Drive

Hello readers!

Last week was reading week, which was much needed for the extra time to work on a few projects! Luckily, my group for the ADED 1P32 project was eager and prepared to get started early, so we were very productive during the break! Before this class, I was used to meeting up with group members in person to divide and conquer the tasks for group projects. This week, I learned that it is a lot easier to collaborate online than I initially thought!

I was already very familiar with Google Drive as I have ongoing projects in 3 of my other classes that I have been using it for. I find that Google Drive is the most user friendly collaborative tool and is very effective in keeping group projects organized. 3 uses for Google Docs/Google Drive that I find helpful are using it to share meeting minutes (especially for those unable to attend; they can keep track of what is going on in real time as the meeting is happening), brainstorming ideas for group projects, and using it to store files and documents that need to be accessed from other computers/locations. This youtube video by Google highlights the main reasons why I prefer Google Drive, especially for sharing documents. Rather than sending them via email, which creates a copy, storing them in the drive allows all collaborators to edit 1 document. 

I will definitely be keeping this tool on my PLE diagram under the collaborate section. This week, my goal is to review the tools used so far, and evaluate how much I have been using them and whether or not they have been beneficial. We have explored so many new tools and there are a lot to keep track of. Initially, I was under the impression that I would have to use all of them for the duration of the course, but now knowing that we only have to keep the ones that help us the most creates more time to explore our favourite tools. Taking another look at all of the tools and ranking them in order of usefulness needs to be done in order to finalize my PLE by the end of the course.

This Week's Feedly Reader Article

This week, I came across an article that discussed a new online program called Open eBooks. This is a program where children and students in need can access free ebooks on android or IOS devices provided by public libraries, schools and educators serving children in need. Literacy skills are very important skills to learn in order to succeed in life, and digital literacy is becoming more relevant with advancements in technology. I believe that this initiative is a great way to increase fundamental literacy skills (i.e. reading and writing), and at the same time, digital literacy skills for those who may not otherwise have the means to do so. 

Until next week,

Megan

Exploring Evernote

Hello readers!

After a long week of midterms, meetings and assignments, it is finally reading week! I am looking forward to spending time with family and plan to make the most of my time off by getting ahead on projects and readings for the remainder of the semester. Catching up on sleep is also on my list of things to do!

This week in ADED 1P32, we explored Evernote, which is essentially a cloud-based digital workspace. Being unfamiliar with this tool, I found this Introduction to Evernote SlideShare presentation helpful as it oriented me with the core features and functions. We are currently researching Digital Literacy for a collaborative group project in this class. I found that Evernote is a great way to collect and bookmark information that we may need in assembling our final presentation.

Brown, M. (CC) 2016

My favourite feature in Evernote is the tagging option. I like to keep everything in life, especially school work and notes, as organized as possible. I have gotten into the old-fashioned habit of organizing my notes using a binder and having dividers for each subject. Imagine doing this every year from grade 9 to 3rd year of university... Needless to say, I have a large collection of binders that I am running out of storage space for (and just cannot get rid of because I feel like there may be something that I can use later on!). The tags on Evernote are like a table-of-contents that guide you to the dividers in a binder. In the notebook that I created for Digital Literacy, I tagged each note or clipping with what type of material it was and included digital literacy, so that if I happen to create subsequent notebooks, I can easily search "Digital Literacy" to find all of the information categorized about that topic in a table-of-contents type format.

Evernote is a tool that I will add to the "Aggregate" section of my PLE diagram because it is a great way to collect information and have access to it all in one place. Being at the half-way point in this course, I have had the opportunity to enhance my digital literacy skills through exploring various online tools and reflecting upon them each week. Although some tools have been more useful than others, the new tools that I have added to my PLE have made a positive contribution to my education (i.e. being better able to collaborate with others online, keeping documents more centralized and organized, enhancing my networking skills, etc).

This Week's Feedly Reader Article

Seeing that the focus of our course last week was Twitter, I found the article called Your hospital can and should harness the power of Twitter particularly interesting. I agree with the article in terms of using Twitter to connect with and obtain feedback from patients. Being heavily involved in hospital quality improvement projects, I think that using technology is an efficient and cost-effective way to engage patients and have them provide their feedback to guide patient-centered quality improvement interventions. Oftentimes, it is a challenge to obtain the feedback needed to guide QI projects. Our project is still in its early phases, and it will be interesting to see whether or not technology is a preferred method of collecting feedback in the Niagara Region, due to the aging population and whether or not this demographic has access to technology. 

Creating my PLN

Hello all!

This week in ADED 1P32, I enjoyed getting to use Twitter to expand my PLN. Twitter is a tool that I am already familiar with, and that I use both personally and for both my job. I decided to create a new account for ADED 1P32 so that I could establish an education/online learning theme for this microblog, as my other twitter account is less structured and has more of a leisurely focus. Feel free to follow my ADED 1P32 twitter @mbrownADED or my personal twitter @ohheyitsmegs.

The Youtube video called How To Build Your PLN (Professional Learning Network) guided me to start thinking ahead about what I have to offer to my PLN and what will I learn from it. Students in ADED 1P32 are all unique and have different passions, perspectives and ideas about learning that can be shared with others in their PLN. Simply put, a PLN is a way to share knowledge and learn from others.

I initially included Twitter in my PLE under the connect and share heading. This week, I became more familiar with the "lists" function of twitter and found it helpful in locating my classmates. Lists are helpful if categorized by theme (i.e. students in ADED 1P32, news accounts, etc). If you are looking to find specific updates when checking your twitter feed, you can save time by scrolling through a list rather than the entire feed with all of your followers' updates.

I am interested in using Twitter for this class as I have yet to be able to use a form of microblogging/social media for educational purposes. I think it is a great way to network with others and can really affect the way people perceive you in a digital context. Through this course, I have been able to share my learning experiences with new online tools, and at the same time, have applied them to my medical sciences courses. Thus far, I have learned that becoming a digital citizen is applicable to all degrees and fields of work, and that becoming fluent with various online tools can contribute to increased efficiency, organization, and collaboration in any field.

Each week, I share an interesting article from my Feedly reader. From this week onward, I will create a separate subheading in my blogs for articles to keep things more organized.

This Week's Feedly Reader Article: 

This week, I read an article from the Hospital Impact blog that discussed good health being a societal issue rather than a medical issue. The following quote from the article resonated with me and got me thinking about health quality improvement in terms of what can be done to address the social determinants of health at the primary care level: "It is time we look beyond the four walls of our institutions and see how we can partner with those who have already mastered things like housing and employment". I have learned a lot about varying perspectives of the definition of health, and that it is more than just the absence of disease. As a student studying medical science and healthcare systems, I have come to learn that there are many underlying causes of ill health that can contribute to a patient's symptoms. I feel that it is necessary for medicine to be a multidisciplinary field, not only comprised of healthcare professionals, but also including professionals in housing, employment, etc., as these are major contributors to the overall health of a patient.


Until next week,

Megan