Journal #7: Reflection

I explored a couple different PLNs and affinty groups this quarter.  They were all new to me and I experienced different results with each.  I probably found the Digg RSS reader the most interesting.  Once you have a good number of blogs in your list scrolling through them can be pretty fun.  I've linked to a couple of sample articles I might find on a typical day:

Web Design Ledger
Smashing Magazine
Creative Cow

Although this can end up meandering a bit, it can be very interesting and I think it is valuable.

I also tried delving a bit more into Twitter, Linked-In and joined Acedemia.edu.  I enjoy Twitter but have not found it to be useful for my learning personally.  There are uses for it in learning environments but not for me at this time.  I've tried Linked-In before and found it to be pretty inundated with spam and this time was no different.  This will probably be the last time I try Linked-In.
Academia.edu is really cool site that allows people to post academic papers.  There are ways to search and post to groups by subject.  You can also bookmark papers for later reading.  This is mostly what I have done, but when I have a paper to research for I will have a group of papers to draw from.  You can also follow people like other students and professors.
Creative Cow is an affinity group that I was already familiar with.  I have continued to go to this site during this quarter whenever I have an adobe question.  There are some great boards there to find information.  In general, I'd like to explore more groups to find what works best for me.  

Journal #6: Reflection

I have found the first five weeks to be both challenging and interesting.  I came into the program this semester knowing that I would be immersed in CSS and HTML.  With no background in the languages this was the most intimidating aspect of signing up for the program.  I've found the subject rewarding so far since it is creative and technical.

The most challenging portion of the class has been the bulk of elements and selectors we have gone over in the book.  I am glad in that I feel it is exhaustive and doesn't leave out important details.  This can be daunting as well when I am reading and thinking, 'How will I ever remember some random IE workaround in practice?'  Overall I think when the class is done i will feel confident in at least understanding both languages and I can always go back and review particular behaviors when I want to use them.  I am trying not to stress on memorizing everything and just trying to remember where to look things up and using them and see how they behave.

The most enjoyable part of the course has been seeing text documents come to life with even simple CSS.  The following example was one of the first where I really saw an exercise look like a 'real' website: bistro menu.  I also liked having the background image fixed while the menu scrolls in this example. The most challenging assignment was gathering all of the book exercises and getting them up on the server.  The concept is not that difficult, but devising an organizational system was challenging.  I might work on different computer depending on where I am so I had to coordinate cloud storage with my home system and the server in a way that I always know what is newest and what has been uploaded. I also changed the names of some of my files and thought I had taken the right steps to modify the files on the server but found I had to fix some broken links.

Here's a link to that table:

work table

I definitely feel like having a grasp on layout techniques will tie the skills together for me.

Journal #5: Twitter

I have been a member of Twitter for about a year but have not used it very regularly.  I also had never considered its use for education before now.  I found the article 35 Interesting ways to use Twitter in the Classroom was interesting for uses I had never considered.

My personal experience with Twitter has not been particularly useful.  I find it difficult to find actual people I know unless I know their handle.  I do follow a number of people though and find that it can be useful to find news and links to interesting articles.  I think if I was more active I might find more I am interested in.

As far as learning, I think that after reading the articles Twitter can be very useful.  It seems like this brings information to the student in a format that they are already active in.   This can stimulate interactivity and participation in the class.  Students that might not post to class boards elsewhere online may be more inclined to do so on Twitter.  I do think that this would have more limited use in adult education however.

Q1: If I was try following Twitter tags to attempt to learn a skill, would I find it effective?

A1: I did follow some hashtags for various subjects related to the program in order to get some new ideas.  I kept an eye on photoshop tags and dslr tags since I am also in the video production class.  I did not find it particularly helpful though.  In fact, I found it to be distracting.  I wouldn't say nothing interesting came through the feed, just nothing that was immediately relevant.  I do like Twitter for getting exposure to some interesting links and finding news stories from journalists I follow, but not for learning anything specific.  In a classroom setting I do see its value, but for my personal learning, not so much.

Q2: Does Twitterfall help to organize my feed?

A1: I did like the concept of Twitterfall.  It is cool to type in tags a watch stuff roll by in a different window while I'm doing something.  Twitter and Twitterfall are fun and interesting at times.  To be honest though I find probably 75% of tweets to be either uninteresting or self-promotional.  I also find that you have certain members who just post too much.  I'll have to look at how to filter that out.  In all the most interesting tweets I found to be from blogs I was already familiar with and am a fan of.