A Reflection of Web 2.0 Tools ...

This post will be a reflection of what I learned in MIS course. Through the three various assignments of this course, I have mastered the use of technology as never before. I practiced training and teaching skills for the first time. This course was difficult at the begging and needs time and hard work, but at the end it brings me much more in return. We learned and practiced web tools in two projects. The first one was training sessions where each student explain one of the web 2.0 tools. The second project was   practical and we were assigned to create a Google site for our learning reflection and a blog to practice using these tools.

Here is my learning reflection about these tools and I arranged them according to my preferences … 

1.     Blog

I found it really enjoyable doing this blog. I like the idea of the new way to share my interesting things with others. The most challenging part is what topic I am going to post and what gadgets to be added???. I should be real in picking things that interest me, this is the main idea of blog!!. I liked people commenting on what I post. I also liked the fact that Blogger have a good support of Google and I can singe directly with my Google account...

2.     Twitter

     It was one of the tools that we studied in this course ... and I was assigned to train students in how to use twitter. I started with no idea about it, but I end up using twitter every day ...!. It really makes me connected and updated to everything I care about..

3.     Google Reader ( RSS Feed )

     Google Reader is a tool for gathering, reading, and sharing all the interesting blogs and websites. I liked the idea of getting live web feeds from these sources directly to my computer ...

4.     Google Chrome

     It was the first time using Google Chrome as all students were advised to use it for MIS course projects. I think I am going to use it for my educational and personal purposes from now on, because of speed, being easy to use and I really don't have to worry about updates ...

5.     Picasa

Once we started using Picasa I figured out that this program is going to be much easier than Photoshop program. It displays pictures clearly with high resolution. I learned how to easily add a photo with a simple click and edit some features to it using photo editing effects . I also found Picasa great to store pictures and collect them in different albums under different labels. I used this tool a lot for my blog and Google sites ...

6.     Face book

 Facebook is a great tool to spread your thoughts and views to the masses and in return get inspiration from the successful ones. I use this tool to be socially connected and updated , and also to keep connected with my classmates after graduation ...

 7.     Gmail 

It was difficult for me to quit Hotmail at the beginning, but after experiencing Gmail I  highly recommend people go totally for Gmail instead . I found that Gmail has lots of space, instant search, conversation view, built-in chat, secure and you can create labels, filters ...

8.     Google Docs

Google Docs allows me as a student to share documents with my classmates.  I can allow them to edit the document or to view it. Google Docs also helped me a lot in work with my group in collaborative projects. We saved time and paper revising and correcting our documents and Power Point presentation together online using this tool. I found the automatic saving feature a clever idea ...

 9.     Google Searching

It is the most used search engine on the world wide. I almost use it every day to find the information that I am looking for especially for my projects. I always refer to this tool to use its different features such as  weather search, translation, currency conversion and time in other cities ...

10.        Google Earth

I found this imagery tool clever, accurate and clear. Google Earth allows me to explore the world’s geography and access all kinds of information about our planet. I can now travel, take photos and videos of places I like, give directions and recommendations, and post these all online and share it with my family and friends …

11.       Google Calendar

I found the features of this tool very useful. I can share schedule with my friends and family. I can remember the events easily since it has  a customizable reminder which allows me  to stay on schedule. I can invite other people to events on my calendar. The one I like most is accessing the calendar from my mobile version of Google calendar. Life becoming easier ..!

  12.       Google Site

I found this tool difficult at the begging and by the time things became  easy ..!!. It was interesting to find that the information I collected for building my site lead me to be even more creative in my study. However, I struggled with the size limit of my site and I think Google sites would be awesome and more suitable for small projects ...

13.       Social Bookmarking ( Delicious )

  Delicious is great in organizing different sources of information that are relevant to me, and also great in building a history of useful resources for social sharing. I used this tool in   organizing the information that I collected for different projects throughout this course, and sharing the resources with my classmates. It saved my time...

In closing,

I would like to add that I have really enjoyed the experience of this course and projects, ..  It really enriched my knowledge. I appreciate the support of Mr.Tridib chatterji  and his feedback to our performance and progress, "Thanks a lot ".  I think I was truly fortunate to study this course …