As a college student who wants to utilize technology to revolutionize his learning experience and revamp his/her education life, there are some apps developed just for you. These apps help you organize your work and enrich your learning experience. Some of these applications are featured in this article citing your advantages and disadvantage or alternative applications where possible.
Rescuetime
This application helps students to manage their time and allocate it to more important tasks. While it works on various platforms, it tracks computer use activity and generates reports that show how much time you spend on each activity. This data can help a student to design a timetable that helps him/her focus on important and urgent tasks first and less time to non-productive tasks such as social media. It is a great tool for managing the most important resource, time, and goes for $9 for the premium version. ManicTime is a close substitute to RescueTime and offers similar experience and functionalities.
Slack
It is one of the indispensable tools for student as it offers instant messaging features and file sharing options. This app allows its users to share your materials and information from a central place. It can help you to do your homework or discuss various concepts you learn in class as a group. Additionally, it can even handle voice and voice calls which makes it multi-receptive to media. This expands its communication capabilities and help teams collaborate better on various tasks while in college. It has a free version that is designed and developed with minimum capabilities and a premium edition with advanced features and safety mechanisms. You can use Azendoo as an alternative to Slack and offers identical services to your users.
Genius Scan
This app helps students to convert some physical learning materials to Portable Document Formats (PDF). All you need as a student is a smartphone with a good camera. Take photos of the materials you want and Genius scan will convert them to PDF for easy archiving and storage. Notes, receipts, contracts, past paper among other important documents are converted into digital format instantly. It is like having a personal document scanner in your pocket. However, this amazing app is available for $8 but it is worth the money. A close substitute for this app is Scanbot which has similar features and functionalities.
Otranscribe
This application helps convert recorded interviews, speech into writing. It helps a student to listen whilst typing the work into a computer. Interviews and lectures can be recorded for varied reasons and using this application to derive word content is a smart approach to store the information. the features on this app help the user to set the best working speed and avoid switching back and forth between apps to type the information. It is simple, safe and secure and integrates easily with YouTube for higher usability. A close possible alternative to this application is the PmTrans which helps students transcribe pre-recorded lectures and interviews.
Focus Booster
This app works with helping a student to focus all his/her energies on a specific task before taking a break or rewarding oneself. It uses a Pomodoro technique that helps student allocate time slots to various activities and breaks to ensure maximum productivity. After several breaks, a longer break is awarded. The technique helps control your desires to get into unnecessary and unproductive activities whilst undertaking an important task. This app comes in handy during the last days of the semester to ensure you absorb as much information as you can before the exams. One of its advantages is that it can be used offline or on the Web. However, it requires a monthly subscription. One of its closest alternatives is Pomodome and Pomodoro keeper.
Wunderlist
This app helps track your tasks and ensure you work on all of them. You tick against the completed tasks or sub-tasks. The design is designed to declutter the app and enhance usability. Unlike many other apps, this app is completely free and helps the user schedule and complete tasks. Students can use this app to serve as your timetable in school for lectures and any other activity they may wish to do. A close substitute to this is Microsoft To-Do which serves nearly similar functions.
Grammarly
Grammarly is an essential tool for students especially those tasked with term paper writing. Grammarly helps student iron out common grammatical mistakes that they can make in the course of writing the paper. It also helps student improve the overall quality of the paper by suggesting various ways to improve the language and avoid plagiarism. It can also help check a pre-written term paper or an essay sample downloaded from an educational website. The only problem with this tool is its premium version which goes for $30 per month. A possible substitute to this software is Editsaurus. Check out Grammarly Review for more information about the product.
Wrap-up
Concisely, the above described apps play important roles for students and they help them achieve varied goals whilst in school. Those that are not free we have featured alternatives to help you make informed choices on if the cost is worth.
