We’ve made it through our slew of January workshops and just barely through the first week of classes here at Academic Computing, but I thought I’d take a moment to respond to a question I have been asked again and again by instructors thinking about what to use in the spring semester: “what is the best tool to use with my students?” My answer to these queries has tended to meander, was hopefully diplomatic, but eventually got to an answer which is not really an answer: “maybe that is not the question you are really asking, let’s talk about what your goals are.”
Unfortunately, there is no “best” tool because, as instructors, we all have different goals. In order to address those goals we need a proper understanding of what our goals are. At Academic Computing, we’ve spent a lot of time in the last year talking about emerging technologies like wikis, digital storytelling, and virtual worlds. These all seem cool and exciting, but will they help you? Sure there is some intrinsic value to tools that are exciting if that gets your students excited about your course, but selecting tools that are new and shiny without proper consideration for how they fit into your pedagogical goals, is frequently going to lead to burn out on your part (if not your students’) or other disappointing results.
Rather than evaluating whether a tool will be useful for you as an instructor, consider what you are trying to change about your teaching, either in terms of the student experience or about yourself as the instructor. Then consider what technology tools can help with that. Remember technology is a tool, not a magic solution to life’s problems, so before you can choose the right tools, you have to consider what is the problem you are really trying to solve or address.
Let me give you a story from my own experience as an instructor. One of my favorite technologies out there is wikis: websites that are built collaboratively by teams of people. I think wikis are fantastic, extremely powerful, not too difficult to use, and just all around a great piece of technology. Though I’ve been working with wikis for several years in a variety of professional and non-professional settings, I have yet to incorporate the use of wikis into my own teaching. I’d love to just because wikis are exciting (to me) and they present some great opportunities for collaborative work. But the fact is, for the courses I’ve taught recently, other tools (tools I happen to be less excited about) have been a better fit for my pedagogical goals and the needs of my students.
As a final note, consider how you will evaluate the success of whatever tools you choose. Perhaps you hope to see a change in the quality of your student’s work, or you may receive informal feedback from students; perhaps you need a more formal system such as an end-of-semester questionnaire or survey. You may even ask the Center for Teaching to conduct a mid-semester evaluation. Whatever tools you choose, remember your goals and don’t let the technology jeopardize them.
Image credit: jodigreen (via Flickr) used under a Creative Commons license.