Thing 21: Productivity Tools

So, I’m looking at productivity tools again.  I did download Evernote last year, but I ended up abandoning it.  I wasn't sure I wanted my home and school life that connected and the tech guy at school wasn't all that excited about letting me have Evernote at school.  I see the advantages of having one go-to spot, but there are disadvantages, too.  Software changes, disappears, or morphs into pay-as-you-go services, not to mention that companies sell off your information, so that putting everything in one place lets them sell more of your information at once.  Yes, I'm being paranoid, but...

So right now I use the Calendar app with Groupwise for all of my appts that affect work.  For other things at home I just use an old-fashioned paper calendar.  I don't tend to use my phone much for the web, unless it is to look for hours, directions, or phone numbers.  I like the Lists and Tasks in the Calendar app.  There was a learning curve when I learned how to sync to the appropriate calendar, but that is not a problem now.  

As described in previous posts, I already have Lookout on my phone and I am increasingly using GoogleDrive.  I’m actually thinking of using Google Classroom for our professional tech group instead of Moodle because Moodle is so intimidating.  I’m using GoogleDrive’s capabilities with my students, my colleagues, and my union.  With the rise of Chromebooks, I think that I will use it more, not less.  

I looked at Zotero because it was already on my Firefox browser at home.  I watched the tour video, though I had to watch it through Youtube.  It looks like a great tool for high school and college students and for adults, but it seems way too complex for my elementary students.  I might show it to my family-history-obsessed sister though.

So I had to remind myself about the difference between browser add-ons, extensions and bookmarklets.  Having explored that, I hope that bookmarklets might be the key to getting some more features out of our computers at school.  Add-ons and extensions don't really work because they slow down the already slow computers so much AND because you usually have to involve the tech guy in their installation.  He helps me when he can, but he is overworked and I hesitate to ask for things that aren't essential.  For example, Clearly looks good, but is problematic.  In addition, since he has to be involved for each one, I would have to commit to a browser, which I haven't.  I probably like Firefox the most, but at school, since you can only be logged into your profile on one computer and I am usually logged into 3 at a time, it doesn't work for me.  Some of the computers default to IE, in fact, our generic library login, that we use to turn all of the computers on, uses IE to automatically load the school webpage and the catalog.  The students can't open IE when they log in, however.  They generally use Chrome as the default browser.  So, I am constantly changing browsers which would require the add-ons to be installed on all 3 browsers.

With that said, I went back and looked at the Readability bookmarklet.  I dragged ReadNow to my bookmarks and used it to look at a web page.  For my reading, it seems to be a viable option because it gets rid of the adds, pictures, slideshows, and animation that drive me crazy!  However, for kids it strips SOOOO much out of the webpage that it makes it less appealing.  A fine line to be sure, but one to consider.  

While still considering the Reading options, I decided to do a Google search to see if I could find a comparison.  I ran into a LifeHacker article comparing Pocket vs. Instapaper vs. Readability, a Mashable article on the 5 Best Read-It-Later Apps, and Best Reading List Apps for Android: Pocket vs. Readability vs. Papermill vs. Pulse.  All three seem to lead to Pocket, so I think I will check it out.  Flipboard came preinstalled on my phone, but it seems to be more for feeds than for marking pages for later reading. 

I made a Pocket account.  You can sign up with Google or another e-mail account.  I dragged the bookmarklet to my bookmark list and I have to admit that it seems easy to use.  I’m torn about downloading the app to my phone.  Just like so many apps, it seems like I am giving them permission to touch everything in my phone: Wi-Fi, contacts, USB storage, and use accounts on this device.  Am I the only person who worries that we are giving these app designers access to everything?!  I’ll have to try Pocket more on my computer at school to decide if the app on my phone is worth it.  I certainly receive a lot of links to sites and articles on my e-mail account that I’d like to clean out of there!

I could really see using the Pocket account with students to keep all of their resources in one place.  I could either have them sign up with their Google accounts (if that works) or sign up with a generic library account and have them use tags to mark their content.  Certainly something to consider.

 

I looked into OneTab.  It looks really useful, but it is an extension, so it won’t work at school where I really need it.  It is available for Chrome as well as Firefox though so that is definitely a plus.

I briefly explored the Setting Up Multiple email Accounts post and saved it in Pocket for later!  As an LMS, the limit of 20 linked accounts means I could never use it with a grade, do it is only useful for clubs or really individual projects, but still…

I took a look at EdShelf which I will definitely put in Pocket to explore more.  I think that I will bring it up at our next Professional Technology Meeting as well.  I noticed however that there are many listed apps that are not reviewed AT ALL.  I think that I would definitely want to look at how many reviews there are before looking at the apps. 

I took one final look at the How We Work series from LifeHacker, but I didn’t really get any pearls of wisdom. 

Pocket seems to be the best tool I got from this Thing.  Let’s see if I continue to use it!