Managing Study and Work with Digital Tools: Notion, OneNote and Evernote

Whether fully online mode or blended mode, digital tools can help teachers and students manage projects and resources across different subjects more effectively and efficiently. This article explores and compares the prominent features of three digital tools: Notion, OneNote, and Evernote. HKU teachers and students may see this article for a reference to select tools to help facilitate work and study. 

Access to three apps

To sign up for these apps, you can visit official websites and create an account with your HKU email. Notion now offers an educational free plan link for educators and students, and HKU teachers and students can enjoy Microsoft OneNote for free with the HKU license for Microsoft Office 365. There is no educational plan offered by Evernote but there are still some good features to help users to manage work or study.

How digital tools help teachers and students

For teachers, these tools may help:

• create a 24/7 digital learning space for students to access;
• enable student collaboration and extended learning outside the classroom;
• track students’ learning progress;
• design and provide summative and formative feedback to students.

For students, these tools may help:

• organize school work and projects;
• take notes for on-the-spot exercises;
• visualize learning progressions.

Features: Similarities and differences

The table below compares features among Notion, OneNote and Evernote. You can refer to the given information to help you select the tool that suits your teaching or learning needs:

After the comparisons, it shows that Evernote helps users to organize work and study but with limited functions and features for free. Notion and OneNote may benefit teaching and learning activities more. The following highlights more functions and features that teachers and students can realize with the tool Notion or OneNote:

For teachers who are interested in using e-learning tools in the classroom but still need some help, you are welcome to book a consultation with Technology-enriched Learning Initiative (TELI) for more ideas by contacting via enquiry@teli.hku.hk.

Extended readings

• User Guide to Notion for Education: https://tl.hku.hk/2021/11/user-guide-to-notion-for-education/ 
• User Guide to OneNote for Education: https://onenoteforteachers.com
• User Guide to Evernote for Education: https://help.evernote.com/hc/en-us/sections/204079098-Ways-To-Use-Evernote

Written by Mr Abdul Hasan Ai Asyari, Ms Han Xiurong

Reviewed by Ms Cindy Liang, Dr Leon Lei

Message from Technology-Enriched Learning Initiative
 

Registration

As the generation of digital natives, our students are accustomed to immersing themselves in virtual environments for entertaining and socializing every day. Education should also make a quick response in constructing a fantasy learning context where students could perform multiple learning tasks beyond the reality restriction. In an educational setting, fantasy has often been used in the form of narrative-based scenarios to engage learners and immerse them in virtual activities.

In this session, we will present three cases of using fantasy context in different learning activities to enhance students’ learning performance, course engagement, and provide a joyful learning experience. One educational technology software Pixton will be applied to set up the fantasy context. With easy-to-build illustrated comics, storyboards, and custom characters, the three cases utilized different functions to build fantasy context from course assessment, in-class collaborative learning, to overall gamification. This session will also introduce practical guidelines and pedagogical implications to inform better use of the fantasy context and the software itself.

Message from Technology-Enriched Learning Initiative
 

Registration

Since the early stage of the pandemic in early 2020, teachers have had to adopt online, hybrid flexible (HyFlex) or other new modes of teaching. Teachers are often excited to design learner-centred and sustainable online/virtual/blended learning experiences with cutting-edge learning technologies. However, teachers often need adequate technical/pedagogical support for the development beyond emergency virtual instruction.

“Instructional Design Extension Assistant (IDEA)” is a UGC-funded scheme implemented by TELI from 2021 to 2023. Instructional designers co-develop virtual instructional materials with teachers for blended learning. The scheme supports teachers transforming their blended instruction in the next stage, based on the scholarly research from the learning science field.

In this webinar we would like to showcase several cases from different Faculties in the e-learning co-development process. In particular, we would like to introduce several useful e-learning/teaching tools succinctly:

• Sustainable education (Learning analytics)
• Collaborative group learning activities (Miro)
• Student knowledge management (Notion)
• Self-paced learning modules (Open edX)

This webinar is supported by the UGC Special Grant for Strategic Development of Virtual Teaching and Learning.

Message from Technology-Enriched Learning Initiative
 
Part I

Part II

With the increasing digitisation of classrooms, there is constant interest to adopt emergent technologies into teaching and learning. Virtual reality (VR) is one of the new technologies that piqued the interest of educators around the world with the promise to create new learning experiences. It is seen as a valuable tool to create immersive environments and provide a student-centered learning experience through interactions.

While the benefits of AR are apparent, widespread adoption of this technology remains a work in progress. There are many practical issues and concerns yet to be addressed, such as ease of use, scalability and comparative effectiveness. As such, steps taken by pioneers in adopting VR would be insightful for mindful educators.

In this two-part webinar we have invited professional educators from different institutions to share their experience in using VR technology in their classes. In particular, our guest speakers will cover the following topics:

• Part I – 28 March 2022 (Monday) 14:30 – 15:30 (HKT, UTC+8)
  • Secondary students using VR for heritage discovery
  • Interdisciplinary Teaching and Learning with VR
  • Leveraging VR creation in cultural heritage education
• Part II – 4 April 2022 (Monday) 12:30 – 13:30 (HKT, UTC+8)
  • Practical VR & AR in studio-based learning for architectural design
  • Using web-based VR for crime scene investigation studies
  • Large-scale VR adoption in medical anatomy classes

Speakers details and more information can be found on the event webpages:

https://eteaching4u.org/virtual-reality-for-teaching-learning-and-assessment-part-i/

https://eteaching4u.org/virtual-reality-for-teaching-learning-and-assessment-part-ii/ 

Acknowledgement

This webinar is supported by:

– UGC Special Grant for Strategic Development of Virtual Teaching and Learning – Inter-institutional Collaborative Activities Projects

– IEEE Education Week

– IEEE Region 10 Education Activities Committee

– IEEE Hong Kong Section Education Chapter

Registration

The use of digital tools has been a growing trend in teaching and learning activities. For example, teachers manage course schedules and content with Moodle, teach synchronously/ asynchronously with Zoom. At the same time, students create assignments via Google and Microsoft applications, submit assignments via Moodle or Turnitin, and communicate with peers and instructors through different social platforms. Have you ever thought about an all-in-one platform that helps to compile most of the work and keep the instructor and students working together in a shared space? Have you thought about a space that enables students to manage their projects, visualise learning progress and collaborate with student peers?

In this webinar, we invite guest speakers from different sections in HKU to share their experiences with Notion, an all-in-one workspace that supports note-taking, collaborative work and project management.

You are invited to join the sharing and discussion with our guest speakers on how they have compiled teaching and learning activities, facilitate students to work collaboratively and manage teamwork with Notion.

Click to view the User Guide to Notion for Education:
https://tl.hku.hk/2021/11/user-guide-to-notion-for-education/

If you would like to co-develop a Notion space for teaching and learning purposes, please contact Dr Leon Lei (culei@hku.hk) to book a consultation. Click here to know more about the IDEA scheme offered by TELI: 
https://tl.hku.hk/2021/07/instructional-design-extension-assistant-idea-scheme/