This reflective portfolio will outline my thoughts and experiences prior to studying, during and towards the completion of the unit, as well as the insights I've gained and any changes that I've gone through in my search for wisdom about the web.
Why?
Why?
I’m in my final semester of my Bachelor’s Degree in Business
and Commerce – Marketing and I've 3 electives left to complete. I remember looking
at all the options that were available to me and came across the unit: Living, Learning
and Working on the Web. I was intrigued by the unit outline
as it noted that it “prepares students to live, learn and work in a digital
society… and provides students an opportunity to develop
a professional online web presence and identity… relevant for the future of
work”.
The Freedom of choice
Studying online is definitely unlike any face-to-face
learning I’ve experienced before. I needed to be more disciplined, determined
and responsible to ensure that I complete my work on time and to receive great
marks. Online learning is a convenient way to study and to be accountable for my own independent learning (Sit et al., 2005). Because it offers the flexibility of learning at my own pace and from
any location, I was required to make sure that I put aside the necessary time
and effort that the tasks at hand required whilst juggling my work/life balance,
if I wanted to do great. Appana (2008) stated that in order for online students to be successful, they need to be motivated, committed and have appropriate support. I know that there were times where I didn’t get a chance to study some of
the weekly topics e.g. Relationships or perform the related activities in order
to focus on a number of assessments. However, I’ve learnt that with the limited
time I have in my daily life due to work and family responsibilities, I need to
learn to prioritise better to ensure that I have my bases covered but I should
also remember that some of the times, the more important things will prevail.
Social Interaction
One of the requirements of the unit was to create a Facebook account and join the LLWW Facebook group. Based on past research, online courses are better equipped when communities of practice is developed as well as by incorporating social networking sites to assist in open discussion and community building among students (Brady, 2010). With my personal Facebook account, I simply became a member. I believe that the Facebook group
was a great way to learn about the topics covered in the unit, to have access
to related articles that Jenna (the unit coordinator) and other students have
shared as well as to be able to ask questions and get instant response either
from Jenna or from other students. It was also the perfect platform to post our
thoughts about the unit or the weekly topics and to share our blog posts for
other students to read and critique. During the first week of the semester, I
posted about why I chose the unit, how social media is a huge part of my life
and what I hoped to gain from the unit in terms of having a professional online
presence. Subsequently, on one of the videos a student posted called “5 ways
social media screws you over”, I commented with “I agree that social media has
its pros and cons… keep in touch… get people’s
identity stolen since most of us post about every single thing…” I
have also read a number of blogs, which I gave my constructive criticisms on.
Overall, I interacted with Jenna and other students to fully experience what it
was like to study a unit through the social platform.
Interesting Topics
and Insightful Activities
Some of the weekly learning materials that I was interested
in included Employability, Surveillance, Information and Knowledge, Digital Inequalities
and Lifelong Learning. After watching Eli Pariser’s video, I also learnt what the Filter Bubble meant, which
is my own personal online world that have been decided based on my
characteristics. Now I know why I seem to always find the same sort of posts on
my Facebook newsfeed based of the posts I’ve previously “liked”. Eli mentioned
that “the internet is showing us what it thinks we want to see but not
necessarily what we need to see”. It’s a shame to learn that having online
access doesn’t necessarily mean having access to everything online, but that my
access is tailored to me based on my computer, browser or previous searches. This
is a topic I’m definitely interested in exploring after this unit.
It was insightful to watch Dr George Simmens’ video about Connectivism as it made sense that we learn through a network world, where we link our current knowledge with new ideas in order to develop our perception and understanding. We also connect with other people through social media or mobile devices in order to find out about the things we don’t currently know. It’s something I didn’t consider before. Of course we learn through reading books, and watching online lectures and going through online articles but when I really think it through, it’s not just me learning on my own. I’m learning because an author has written a book, a lecturer has prepared a lecture and because someone somewhere has written articles that I’ve come across. In essence, we are all connected that way.
First Time Blogger
Having read through the learning guide, I gathered that I
needed to write blogs and possibly publish these for everyone to see. I must
admit, I was a little scared as I hadn’t written, let alone, published a blog
in my life! However, I pushed through and created a blog site on Blogger called Discovering
Learning Improving – Making sense of it all. Then, I published my first ever
blog post entitled Digital Autobiography. It was a good start. I was telling my
story about how the digital world has changed the way I communicated with
people, from putting pen to paper and writing letters, which would take weeks
to get a response, to using my mobile device and getting instant reply, and
questioned how much more changes will occur in the future. After receiving 2
comments for improvements, I learnt that it was a good choice to publish it on
Blogger early and to share a link of my blog post on the Facebook group for
others to see, so that I could make any necessary corrections prior to
submitting it for marking.
Subsequently, I learnt, from seeing others’ blog post, that
I could make mine more interesting by putting my references using hyperlinks
for readers to simply click on if they wish to read further and by adding
colours or images, which I did with my next blog posts. Looking back at my first
blog post now, I realise that, even then, I was “cautious of hackers” and of
people knowing my whereabouts, as well as about the wealth of personal
information I give everyone access to. No wonder why Week 4’s topic of
Surveillance really struck a chord with me. I learnt a great deal about the
possibilities of losing my privacy and about sharing too much personal information by
being oblivious with my online activities. It also made me think about all the places
where I’ve left my digital footprint, which now seems impossible to erase.
Because of this, I was inspired to write about it for my second
blog post, where I mentioned that the Power
of Privacy documentary really opened up my eyes about online surveillance.
It was a great piece, which I’ve actually watched several times now. Having
learnt from my first blog post experience, I published my second blog post on
Blogger and shared a link on the Facebook group again so as to make
improvements to it before submission. This resulted in achieving a much better
mark on my second blog post than my first. I am very happy on how I’ve
expressed myself and my thoughts on my second blog post that I chose to submit
it for inclusion to the Book of Blogs for this unit.
Change for the better and for the future
Before studying the unit, I was happily posting Facebook status about absolutely anything I thought of at any given moment, checking in at all the different places I've been to and uploading images and videos of my life! I searched for anything I wanted to know about, from what's a good nearby restaurant to visit, to where I can buy pink shoes, or how to be more creative. I absolutely relied on Google maps to get me from one place to another and to advice me on traffic updates. Towards the middle of the unit, and after coming across the Surveillance topic, I've limited my Facebook posts to the bare minimum; I think I've only posted about 2-3 times for the last 7 weeks when I would normally post at least that much every couple of days! I'm also wary about how much I use Google maps as I've found it saved my whereabouts. It's interesting how I actually don't feel lost by doing this; I feel a little more secure about my privacy and find that I have better relationships with my closest friends, since we actually have conversations in person rather than online chats with distant acquaintances. I'm not sure if I'll feel the same way in the future but I do know that studying the unit have definitely helped me become more aware of how I should safely conduct any activities online and am now more knowledgeable about the ever-growing online world.
References:
Appana, S.
(2008). A review of benefits and limitations of online learning in the context
of the student, the instructor, and the tenured faculty. International Journal on ELearning, 7(1), 5-22. Retrieved from
https://search.proquest.com/docview/210364167?accountid=36155
Sit, JWH. Chung, JWY. Chow, MCM. Wong, TKS. (2005). Experiences of online learning: student's perspective. Nurse Education Today, 25(2), 140-147. Retrieved from http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0260691704001492
Brady, KP. Holcomb, LB, Smith, BV. (2010). The use of alternative social networking sites in higher educational settings: a case study of the E-learning benefits of ning in education. Journal of Interactive Online Learning, 9(2), 151-170. Retrieved from http://www.ncolr.org/jiol/issues/pdf/9.2.4.pdf
