During our English 250 class, I have been able to analyze the different ways that we can use technology in our current society. This digital literature class opened my eyes up to the amount of tools that we have available to us on a day to day basis. The most recent tool that we learned how to use was hypothes.is which is a tool that is used to make annotations and comments on the internet/websites and it allows you to interact with other users as well. Since learning about this tool, I have been able to use it to help myself in other classes and I noticed how much of an impact that these things will cause for both teachers and students both in and outside of the classroom. Being able to keep track of notes and being able to communicate with peers learning the same material as you can prove to be successful in most cases. However, we also have to think about the possible constraints that working digitally can cause.
In my opinion, we should be teaching students more about online tools that will help guide school work because technology is advancing so quickly, and soon almost everything will be digital. We need to learn how to take advantage of these tools to be able to thrive in this new digital age. Let me know what you think about the ways that technology could impact classroom learning in our future!
March 6, 2018 at 6:29 am
I totally agree that we should be learning about more digital tools. We are constantly surrounded by technology, and yet most of us only use the basics, like online textbooks or canvas, when it comes to our school work. While those things are great, and have made life a lot easier for student, they really only scratch the surface of what’s possible. I think we should definitely utilize google drive more, for example, so that we can share documents and collaborate easily. I’m sure there are many more programs that I don’t even know about that could help me tremendously with school.
March 6, 2018 at 4:33 pm
Hypothes.is is a truly powerful tool, I have already started using it for classes and researching in general, and recommending it to others for research. I agree we should learn about digital tools like Hypothes.is, and classes should try to incorporate the use of digital tools into more coursework, but do you think that digital tools can fit into any curriculum? The tools we discussed in this class work precisely because they can help us with literary analysis in particular, although I’ve managed to use the same tools in political science and business classes. What potential uses for hypothes.is do you think could perhaps be ideal for a future version of this course?
March 6, 2018 at 9:05 pm
I definitely agree that we should be teaching students more pragmatic applications for digital tools. We have the digital infrastructure, we have the users, we have the data, we just need to make it clear to people why they should care. One really useful suggestion I got from a media professional was to use a tool like Voyant to generate a word-cloud from job applications, select the most frequent key-words and then use those words in a cover letter to apply for the job.
March 7, 2018 at 2:38 am
Your post has generated a conversation that is very useful to me, personally, as an educator. Thank you for that! I’ve been thinking a lot about how I might use some of the tools we’ve covered in class in my composition classes as well as in the work I do with colleagues. I eagerly await anyone’s ideas about how Hypothes.is could be used to great advantage.
March 10, 2018 at 6:14 am
As many others have stated above, I believe technology should play a critical role in our classrooms. My mother is a high school teacher and my brother teaches 5th grade. They both utilize technology in their classrooms to different ends. Seeing them hands-on with their respective audiences, it’s clear that experimentation is absolutely critical to determine the most effective uses of digital tools in education. As we’ve seen in this class, not all uses of technology prove to successful in practice, but the only way we can find that out through the practice itself. When combining an emerging field with pre-existing systems, a certain level of fluidity is necessary when figuring out how to get the most out of said combination.
March 17, 2018 at 4:17 am
I 100% agree with this! Digital tools are very important and exciting and useful, but there is some harm in it. I see where you’re coming from and I hope that we can find a healthy middle ground in order to find the best option.