Google has become my best friend
during the previous 3-4 years. Every day I wake up, open my computer, press on
the home button key and my best friend appears in front of me- iGoogle.
Google has made our life easier,
I am not sure whether it’s good or bad because now I don’t overload my memory
with different information, as when I want to remember something or learn a new
thing, find a definition of a word or whatever it takes me two or so minutes to
find it…
However the amazing thing about Google
is not limited to its search engine possibilities it has many apps which make
our life even easier. I’ll speak about the ones that I use very often and also the
ones that I’ve learnt from this course.
First of all I would like to
mention Google scholar. Besides the EBSCO, Eric or Jstor, which are very famous
journal article search WebPages, I use Google scholar very often as well. It
helps me to find the necessary articles very quickly. The next app that I use
quite often is Google map. I use this app whenever I want to find a place in
Armenia and around the world as well. It was new for me to learn that this tool
can be also used for educational purposes. According to Sarah Ring (2011), the
teachers can use Google apps before going to a field trip, or when learning
directions in class etc…
Another widely spread Google apps
is the Blogger. Blogging has become part of people around the world recently.
People from business world, education, engineering, news, fashion, arts, sport,
any sphere you can imagine, keep their own blog, where they share their
thoughts and ideas. Blogger is also widely implemented for educational
purposes. Teachers make this amazing tool part of their syllabus and this way
they use it for teaching and learning purposes. I myself started using the
blogger as a part of my assignments, however I really want to either create a
new one, or continue this one and share my thoughts and ideas other than
related to teaching and learning. Because in life there are many situations,
problems, funny things and just ideas that you want to share.
I also want to talk about Google
docs. I am so happy that I have learnt about this amazing tool and indeed it
has already become part of my life. I use it both for my studies and just for
sharing information as well. It’s a great place to collaborate with others. The
only thing that you need to have is a Google account and internet connection.
The RSS feeds help you to be
connected to others’ blogs and be updated about the fields you are interested.
Google image search, Google book search enables people to find what they want. Another
great app is Google calendar. I wasn’t using this app before but now I have
started using it and now I am not afraid to forget any upcoming event, deadline
or a meeting.
There are many other apps which
Google offers to its’ users and the only thing needed from us is to be informed
and take the advantage of having a computer, internet and Google!
However, whatever you do in the
internet, whichever page you access or whatever activity you start doing does is
not “very private”. Meaning that all you actions, want it or not, is
automatically saved somewhere. This somewhere is called “cloud computing”. Without
pressing any save buttons all your actions are stored in a place which is not visible.
This YouTube clip http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=88ysB-EKA9U helped me to
spread light the idea of cloud computing, however it wasn’t very clear to me
unless one of my classmates brought an example. She said “ it’s like renting a
territory to keep your possessions”. It is not like someone else’s computer,
and it’s not like that nobody can see your actions. However it’s safe and easy
way to keep your files, logs and information which you may need someday.
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