Participate 1.1.2 Joining a Digital Learning Community Quest

While I was completing my M.Ed. in Instructional Technology from the University of West Georgia, I desperately sought a digital tool to keep up with all of the fantastic resources I found. I was very familiar with Pinterest as a bookmarking tool, but I was looking for a tool that was strictly academic. I was thrilled to find Diigo because it allowed me to keep track of an infinite amount of web resources, while making it easy to organize and navigate. I was particularly thankful for Diigo during the research phase of my capstone portfolio. What otherwise would have been an overwhelming, arduous task, was a lot less stressful thanks to the organization provided from Diigo.

[my diigo]



Intriguing Traits of a Digital Learning Community:
As a high school teacher, a large portion of my time is spent educating students about college. They want to know everything--- what's it like? how much will it cost? are the professors scary? are the classes big? With those constant questions in mind, I was intrigued by the Digital Learning Communities from world-renowned universities. Harvard, Yale, Carnegie Mellon all offer an extensive list of open courses for the soul purpose of sharing resources with the online community. Without a doubt, these resources will be of high quality, and I and my students are certain to learn much from these DLCs. I was also fascinated by the extensive resources that are available at no cost- University of the People and OpenStax provide detailed, organized modules for study at absolutely no cost.

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Open Stax:
I chose to join the Open Stax Digital Learning Community for a few reasons. First, I found the module organization to be appealing. The idea of finding bundles of information on related topics feels like it would make learning easier and more efficient. Second, I was also thrilled to find that all of the resources are free.  Finally, the information provided in the search feature of the database also promotes efficiency-- without clicking and reading the material, one is informed of the date of publication and a percentage that proves the popularity of this information.