Search Skills and Strategies

This weeks learning objective was focused on search skills and strategies that can help students enhance their search outcome. All college students are normally expected to conduct academic research over various academic subjects, and finding the right resources is crucial to be successful in those research assignments.

There are many tips that can help students when using online search engines to look up resources and information. One important tip is that students should search by entering specific keywords and phrases that are related to the topic and use quotation marks to focus on the topic and limit the search results. Also, students should use advanced search options and limitations to help generate a specific type of results (ex. Only search for articles that were published in the last tow years about the topic). This will generate a more relevant and focused search results. In addition, it might be helpful to use more than one search engine or use the meta-search engines which collect search results from all major search engines and project them in one place.

In addition to using online search engines, students should utilize the universities library system and the services it provides. It usually contains a large number of scholarly material that can be accessed online, or sent physically or electronically to the student if needed. This resource can be very helpful for students when working on academic research papers because it provides a large database of reliable academic material. 

Web-Enhanced Listening & Viewing Strategies

This weeks learning guide focuses on introducing and developing skills that are very important when it comes to listening, viewing, and learning academic material online. The module presents helpful note-taking strategies that can improve the quality of both online and in-class learning. In addition, it presents techniques and tips to help increase comprehension when listening to online academic content. Also, it illustrate how beneficial online podcasts are for students.

Some of the most important tips mentioned about note taking is that students should have their notes organized and sort them by topic/class so that they can be easily traced back to the material. Students often take notes on random pieces of paper and end up loosing them, or not know what class and topic they relate to which can be a huge wast of time and effort when students need to study for exams. In addition, when taking notes, students should focus on writing down the important points mentioned instead of trying to write everything dow. Finally, it is very useful for students to use note-taking template to help in organizing the structure of their notes.

In addition to trying to develop excellent note taking skills, students should also focus on their listening skills as well. Thinking about the topic in advance and paying attention to the main points and recording them helps the student to develop a better, deeper understanding about the topic instead of just writing everything down without thinking and trying to memories it later.

Finally, the learning guide lists multiple benefits students can gain by using online Podcasts. The fact that they are available anytime and almost anywhere provides students with the opportunity to learn whenever and wherever they want. In addition, students can view, pause, and rewind the Podcast as many times as needed to fully learn the material. This flexibility is what distinguish Podcasts from traditional class room lectures.

The video above explains the fundamentals of technical analysis used in swing trading . It starts by defining swing trading and why people use this method of trading. Then it explain how to use movements in candle charts to view price and identifying buying opportunities in the market. Finally, it points out that traders should not ignore other macro economical factors that can have direct impact on the markets.


This video help students to understand the basic fundamentals of swing trading and technical analysis. It is useful because it provides a simple and easy to understand video that has high recording quality, clear visuals, and is concentrated on the topic (strait to the point). Students might choose to use this method because it provide visual interaction and it uses movement to explain concepts opposing to just using text and lecture notes. 

Online Readings

One big difference between high school and college is the amount of online readings students are required to do. These reading are assigned in a lot of classes in college and they vary in format from e-books, online research papers, journals, articles, and so on; and being able to successfully familiarize yourself with this online readings is crucial because completing and understanding them is tied to your success in these classes.

One problem students face when trying to complete there online readings is that it is very easy to get distracted, or they just do not focus enough and end up waisting their time skimming back and forth without getting any useful information from the readings. To overcome this issue, students should eliminate any distractions when doing the readings (turn off the TV, log out of Facebook and other sites, ..ect). This will help the student to focus on the reading and increase productivity.

In addition, to enhance the quality and comprehension, students should use the functions offered by the program used to read the material. Some of the most common features are highlighting text, taking in text notes and virtual post it notes, and search document and define words function. By using these tools, students will have the chance to interact with the reading material and will help them memories and understand the material better, thus leading to a greater success in their classes. 

Online learning tools and communication guidelines

The world wide web offers many useful tools and resources that allow students to enhance their learning experience and allow them to better understand the subjects they are studying through active interaction. An example of these tools are online blogs, where authors can express themselves and reflect on their knowledge while getting feedback and comments from readers. This feature allows students to get an interactive learning environment that can further develop their knowledge in the subject they are discussing.

In addition, the Internet offers many different options that enable students to save time and communicate with their peers, team members, and instructors as well. And due to the fact that communicating through the Internet have its unique limitations when it comes to expressing yourself and getting your point across to the other person, there are a set of guidelines called “netiquette” that help in achieving a higher quality and effectiveness in online communication. Following are some important netiquette tips that I believe are very useful for future and current college students:

• Be specific and clear and direct when trying communicate online to avoid and eliminate any possible misunderstanding.
• Be respectful and personable. Because when you use online communication, you are creating a permanent digital record that can be traced back to you at any time.
• When emailing professors, the email should look like a letter (greeting, introduction, request, acknowledgment, closing) instead of looking like an informal text or instant message.

In general, using online learning resources can make your college experience much easier; and it will save you a lot of time and effort. Being smart and respectful when using those resources is a crucial factor that can lead to a great academic success in the future.