Write a blog post on the way in which technologies have affected you or your organisation. Try and incorporate your thoughts on the Conole article and also the examples you found of learning activities that use Web 2.0 technologies.
First of all, I can speak from my own experience and how technologies have affected me and my personal studies as I am not yet an active teacher in order to be able to evaluate the technologies in my teaching experience or any organisation. As a learner then, according to Conole (2008) when a new technology was found I had to experiment with it and check it and see whether it fits my needs in order to successfully use it to support my learning. I agree with Conole (2008) that best results are seen through time because I have heard about blogging and I said to myself what this kind of stuff is now? After that, I said to myself to try it and I did. However, as I was young and still going in lyceum I did not see any benefits or something when I was using it. After 3 years when I went to the University I started using it occasionally and I liked it. Many features that blogging has helped me with my studies and for my own personal life. But only through time I saw the benefits and I realised what is blogging exactly. Another thing is that it is surely difficult to evaluate the right information needed for an assignment or project. In the beginning at least I was finding myself worrying about this matter because I lack the skills needed as suggested by Conole (2008) in order to be able to assess the material found in the web and see whether it is relevant to my studies or not and whether I could use it. After a long time and through many years of experience with the web etc and too much reading from books and from the web I started having a critical eye on the materials I am reading but again I am not 100% sure on my choices.
As far as my teaching experience is concerned and from the investigation I made through the web for the various learning websites and activities that use web 2.0 technologies I believe that there is a vast amount of these available and the teacher has to be able to distinguish among them and choose the best learning activity or the best learning tool that will help not only the teacher but also the students in order to improve their learning experience. There are many choices online and the teacher has to take a difficult decision on which is the best one.
Generally speaking, technologies affected me positively in my life and my learning. Some technologies I consider them to be invaluable as they are not so widely used by me as they do not express me as a person, thus I do not take them into consideration for my work or personal use.