Using Google+ in the Class

I have an Android cell phone, so I already had a Gmail account which automatically transfers to a Google+ account.  Having Google on my cell phones has been really awesome and something I appreciated before taking this English Composition course.  I love the ability to have all of my contacts transferred whenever I upgrade my cell phone.  Also, the auto-backup of the rest of my information has been a lifesaver, especially when it has come to my photos.  I don't know how many times I've lost a cell phone memory card, computer, or CD with photos of my family on them since the digital age made cameras with film that was developed a thing of the past.  I began to use Google+ like I use Facebook at the start of this class and it's growing on me.  It doesn't seem to be catching on as quickly with the population at large, though, so I'm not sure if it will be as useful in the long run as some of the other features Google provides.

Using Google Drive in the Class

I learned to use Microsoft Office when it first became the most popular word processing and spreadsheet program to use. Since then Microsoft added the other programs in the office suite and I learned to use them along the way. With my comfort using Office, switching to Google Drive was an experience that took me out of my comfort zone. I very quickly realized that it was used almost exactly the same as Office and had many other additional features that can't be done with the Microsoft programs. Being able to share my documents with others and both, or all, with access seeing the changes to the document in real time was one of the features that I really like about Google Drive. Also, the benefit of my documents being saved to the cloud so that they can be accessed from anywhere that I have access to a computer with the Internet is extremely beneficial in my role as a student. Gone are the days of "forgetting" a paper or assignment. I find myself using Google Drive for more and more rather than automatically pulling up my former go-to, Microsoft Office.

Blogging in Class

I had serious reservations about the blogging portion of this class when we first started.  I thought that blogging was something that other people did.  In the beginning I was using the topics provided by the professor, and, with his focus on us learning all about the flipped classroom, I was extremely bored.  I got really tired of the subject long before it stopped being a major focus of our assignments.  I learned a lot about the flipped class with the paper that was assigned on this topic.  The research that I did won me over on the benefits of using the teaching method.  I would have liked to skip the group assignment and gone right to that topic.  Our class seemed very redundant with the repeating subject.

When the professor gave us permission to explore other subject matter in our blogs besides the suggestions that he provided, I began to see the charm.  We were able to truly and openly express ourselves and, with the added assignment of reading other classmate's blogs, we also got to know each other through our writing.  When we began to personalize our writing, it opened the door to gaining insight into each other's thoughts and, sometimes, lives.  Blogging has given me an outlet in which I can get some thoughts out of my head instead of letting them swirl around endlessly.  I can now appreciate the assignment and experience.