Lab 23 - You've come a long way!

Working through all the materials that come with the Fluency With Information Technology textbook has helped you build all three components of your technology knowledge:

If you've followed along for all twenty-two labs before this one, you've been introduced to hands-on exercises, real-world examples of the concepts in the book, and tools and methods for continuing to explore informaation technology concepts. So what's left?

To consider:

The last tools to go into your toolbox

In this twenty-third lab, we'll look at additional resources to keep your information technology fluency active and strong. Information technology is changing all the time, and to stay fluent means keeping a current awareness, or making sure you know what events and developments in the field are happening right now. As you explore, review your answers from the To consider: section above. Have you changed your mind about any of them?

Learning more

  1. Following tech names on Twiiter is great for cutting- or bleeding-edge trends, but for keeping current with technology news, blogs are a better choice for in-depth info. But which ones will have the least bias in their reporting, and deliver the most timely information? And if that approach isn't your style, which ones are humorous and have thorough reviews? There are all kinds of criteria to judge the "best" technology blogs. Keep yours in mind as you look at these:

    • Cult of Mac - Breaking news about Apple and Apple products. You can tell by the name it probably won't be exceedingly harsh in its reviews, but the posts are pretty balanced, well-researched, and interesting. RSS feed available.
    • Lifehacker - Tips, tricks, and downloads for getting thigs done. While not 100% technology-focused, Lifehacker embodies the do-it-yourself spirit that comes with IT fluency. They have regular app reviews across all platforms, and a community of loyal commenters helps expand the Lifehacker knowledge base. RSS feed available.
    • CNET - CNET has been around a long time, providing product reviews, news items, and how-to information. Check out their gadget blog, Crave, for the latest technology products. RSS feed available.
    • Wired.com - delivering daily technology news, and related to the print magazine Wired.
    • Official Google Blog - Google employees blogging about their products, technology, and culture. RSS feed available.

  2. Keeping your skills sharp and stretching your knowledge is an important part of maintaing your fluency. There are plenty of sites out there that can help, and here are a few to get you started:

    • Codecademy - you may already be more skilled than some of the lessons on Codecademy, but even those lessons can help you practice what you know.
    • HTML5 Rocks - for more advanced writers of HTML and CSS, this is a development community site, with loads of resources for working with HTML5.
    • A List Apart - deeper explorations of website design and user experience challenges.
    • W3Schools - we've looked at many of their tutorials in this series of labs. If they cover a topic, it's usually a good starting place for understanding basic syntax and introductory concepts.
    • lynda.com - while this site has mostly content you must pay for, there are free resources here as well, including tutorials for open-source projects like Drupal and Ruby on Rails.

  3. There are many other resources out there that we aren't covering here. Perhaps the best resource you have as you leave this lab series is your ability to find out more. Knowing the right words to use when you search, whether you use a search engine or your library's resources, is like having the right key to open a locked door. Stay curious! Wondering about how things work can lead to discovering how they work for yourself. What if you wanted to find out more about Linux-based operating systems? Where would you start? What would you do? Who could you ask?

Moving on

From here, what happens next? Will you consider taking more information technology classes? Will you think about pursuing a career in IT? Could you be the inventor of the next amazing technology product or application? Now that you are fluent in information technology, where will you go from here?