Sometimes it costs to be a technical innovator. I am doing a class at the moment where we are using a wiki to create mobility and collaboration amongst our students. Now on the surface that sounds really cool and innovative. However, I get the distinct feeling that the students are miles ahead of me. MILES! Tonight I had to reset permissions on this quiz we wanted them to take and it simply didn’t work. We tried everything and finally it came up. Only we forgot to put the lettering on the quiz and subsequently it was a failure. One of the questions had choose A or B … at it was placed at A. Two of the students in the room new that well before we did.
During these times of techno-failure (or rather my inability to appropriate it) … I am reminded of Mr. T. His “no-nonsense” approach to the bloke who fell over in this add is great. Whenever something doesn’t work in the wiki I think… ‘get some nuts’. Why? Because if we keep giving these mundane, boring, repetitive, mindless jibber jabber we call lectures… we are going to run out of students.
On the upside students have responded extremely well to the wiki environment with many of them making it their very own. I remember a time when a trip to the library was considered ‘high-tech’. Now, students are creating pages, making blogs and general making a nuisance of us. I believe it’s worth it. I mean how many more years are we going to have to sit through endless repetition until we get it right. Who knows? I say ‘get some nuts’. Try something cool that changes things. This slow and steady crap is for the birds. Do you have technology that you think makes life easier… use it at work. For the next week ask yourself this question what are some of the more productive uses of my ipod? I will leave you with that question and remember don’t back away from the computer… ‘get some nuts’.
Technorati Tags: wiki, mobility, collaboration, Mr. T., technology
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