Since I entered the discussion board this week about how we adapted our classrooms when software/hardware went haywire, I haven't been able to get it out of my mind. My posting was as follows:
"We still have classrooms at my school that have overhead projectors. No, not the digital version, but the transparency version that the instructor has to write on with a marker. And one of our mac labs only has a dry erase board on which to teach so we are way behind! So I’ve requested a smartboard for the mac lab that can be used for presentations/student tutorials etc. I also recently was able to acquire, with the help of a grant, a high-end professional printer for digital photography students to print out their final projects. They love the ability to have their own copies of work immediately. When I get frustrated with our lack of technology, I have to remind myself how important it is to make these necessary changes and that it’s for the students’ benefit and that keeps me focused."
What's been interesting this semester is that I've been given the opportunity to revamp our Center for Teaching and Learning at my college, so these topics are quite timely. My job for the next couple weeks is to meet with all of our department chairs and find out how they're using technology in creative and innovative ways. One of the topics that came up today was how technology, in all its glory, can still bring a set of enormous problems in education, namely, when things don't work. It's that mentality (though somewhat understandable) that's been holding a lot of people back in our particular situation. They're more afraid of what will go wrong, then what will go right! I'll be working to change those ideas by introducing workshops and trainings to help faculty embrace the unknown and to hopefully show them that it's ok to ask for help.
I've found a similar situation with the teachers I work with. While I'm not responsible for any of the technology directly my classes are exclusively in one of our labs so everything I teach incorporates technology - and we've had more than a fair share of technical difficulties this year. Many of the teachers get frustrated by the learning curve of new technology. So many of them have a hefty load already just helping the students learn the language that they can't conceive of first learning the technology themselves and then teaching their students on top of everything else their doing. And when it doesn't work or the learning process takes longer than they wanted they frequently just give up, so they don't loose any more valuable teaching time for the direct language piece. It's a slow process and it can be a frustrating one, but once they embrace the technology feeling confident themselves teaching flourishes in all the possibilities they find with the new tools.
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