My first tool is one that I discovered in this class and it is hypothesis, it is a platform where people can share articles and then they are allowed to publicly or even privately comment and share opinions on the piece. I was actually a huge fan of this tool and enjoyed the assignments that were posted on it a lot, I really liked that we could all share opinions and pinpoint the places we stated and we can all see each other’s view points and you can even see different ideas and interpretations on the same bit and it really makes me think how we can all interpret the same thing differently and it has actually managed to make something very regular such as reading more interactive and fun! Using hypothesis, I believe I developed the skill of seeing things in other people’s eyes , like for example when I write something about how I understood a certain sentence and someone else writes something completely different I feel like I out myself in their shoes and try to see it the same way in order to comprehend how they’ve seen and interpreted it , I also enhanced the skill of speaking my mind and clearly voicing opinions seeing that we were free to do so with no barriers and also to respect everyone’s annotations. Something I did not like about this tool is that sometimes when a lot of people annotate it gets extremely messy and you can’t properly see where each comment belongs to and it gets extremely overwhelming, I believe that it can be made in a more organized sense or have several groups for the same reading in order to preserve the organization and neatness of the annotations. I would definitely use this tools in other classes if I am allowed to as it genuinely made me like reading our assigned readings and managed to make me engage in discussions about the readings and not just want to skim through to get over with the assignment , if I may I might even want to use it with my fellow coaches at the place im coaching at as sometimes we find fitness related articles and just send them on our whatsapp group and it gets a bit hectic because some people miss out on it and we have to keep going back to the article to relate the phrases with the comments and therefore this made me think that hypothesis is suitable for annotating with smaller classes with smaller groups but not for large ones at all
The second tool is slack, it is also a tool that I discovered in class and I actually found out It is more widespread than I thought it was! I believe that slack was a virtual common workspace and actually facilitated the course quite a lot because we were able to constantly stay in touch and keep track and even ask questions. I believe I did not take full advantage of slack, this is primarily because I could not download it on my phone, but I actually really enjoyed reading the conversations I missed later on and the conversations I took part in, I developed the skill of sharing things I find interesting and reading their opinions and accepting differences, I believe I actually also acquired the skill of learning how slack works as it was a new tool and was able to easily navigate throughout. I really liked that we could create several channels in order to keep things more organized and easy to find and even have different discussions about different things simultaneously , I also really liked that we could link our slack workspace to several other useful softwares such as google calendar and google docs , I found this to be extremely useful at times and made keeping up with posted assignments much easier , one thing I also accidentally discovered and really liked was the apps option where you could enter what you want and an app for it would just pop up , I think this would be extremely useful in the actual worklife which I believe is something slack can be extremely useful in , I might even try to implement it also with the head coach at the facility because sometimes our whatsapp group gets a bit chaotic and important information is lost so we can have a channel for schedules, emergencies such as covering sessions, important announcements for us and maybe an information channel where we share our findings and lastly one where we share things we normally do such as meal prepping. I believe slack is actually really suitable for the work/study environment but it is not very casual conversation friendly.
The third tool is zoom, I believe zoom took the world by storm during this pandemic and has actually became an integral part of all of our lives , I believe zoom taught me to be comfortable to speak with my video camera on and eventually taught me how to organize a virtual conversation and how to indicate if someone will speak so I can wait for my turn and also how to focus and learn from a screen! I really liked how we used zoom in this class because it wasn’t like any other, in all other classes we would mute and the dr would speak and we would only speak if we ever had a question however, in this class we made it interactive and we were actually the ones contributing to the lesson , one thing I actually witnessed in just this class was the breakout rooms which is a feature I actually really liked because it was just like in real classes and it was easier to talk and discuss and I really liked that we would share our findings in the end. I also really liked that it allowed many people and I really liked that there was always a fun factor to it when using virtual backgrounds, I did not even know that was a thing! One thing I didn’t like about zoom was the lack of security in its initial versions and the fact that there was no tool to organize the conversation such as maybe having the option for only one person to speak at a time by pressing a button similar to soliya. I would definitely use zoom in the future because it actually facilitated a lot and I think I would use it in group project meetings in particular because it allows us to share things together and agree on them whilst seeing each other and it can be a great substitute for when we can’t agree on timings which is actually quite often. I think zoom is suitable for all kinds of meetings or even a casual video chat!
The fourth tool is soliya, also a core 2096 hidden treasure! Soliya is a platform that allows facilitated conversations with people around the world. I actually developed several skills with soliya, to begin with I also developed the skill of being comfortable to talking with my camera on for several hours , how to voice my opinions and input in a sense that people that don’t speak the same language I do or have the same background would fully understand me , how to attentively listen to different people with different accents and how to organize dialogue in a way that allows maximum benefit to all parties, I also learned some conversation etiquette and that I have a lot In common with people that are completely different than I am! I really liked that soliya had a facilitator because it made the conversations go much smoother and allowed us to effectively speak about several subjects, I also really liked the mic tool that allowed one person to speak at a time because it allowed us to attentively listen and talk only when we have an answer and respected the person speaking as there were no interruptions, what I did not like is that there was no option to turn off the camera which kind of made me feel obligated sometimes. I believe that soliya is not a versatile platform that could be suitable for anything else but the online exchange program and therefore I will not be using it in the future.
The final tool is wordpress, I actually knew wordpress before the course but probably would have never used it, I literally learned the whole art of blogging through this tool, I am not much of a writer but blogging actually makes it a bit lighter unlike essays , it also allows u to interact with each other’s posts and see each other’s work and progress and sometimes some posts actually inspired others, I actually got a lot better at writing and reflecting. What I liked about this platform was that it was different and was actually easy to use when writing and publishing the pieces and had several options in layout, picture options and even privacy options I especially liked the password protected posts because that way you can select the people that see the more sensitive posts. However, I think that wordpress is not the easiest to navigate through as many things are not clearly labelled or found and sometimes I faced a lot of technical issues such as items being sent to draft even though I opted to publish them, I also do not like that you can’t choose your own name in the free version because I believe this is the base of the blog and should be free. I believe wordpress is suitable for all types of blogs and blogging can basically be a part of any industry. In the future, I would definitely use wordpress for other courses but not for my personal use as I am not much of a writer.
These tools taught me that there are always multiple uses for one platform and each tool can serve a different purpose and might even be complementary to one another , they also taught me that I can creatively present anything im assigned to do and that there are always virtual alternatives for daily operations, I also learned that I actually really enjoy things that are interactive and collective and always prefer doing things with people rather than alone and to my own surprise , I am actually good with technology!
