If You Can't Beat Them....

Join them. As the old adage goes, this is the principle behind an article I read on NPR discussing how a college psychology professor is using Snapchat to supplement his classroom and his students learning. the professor knew that a majority of his students were constant users of Snapchat, and devised a way to use their habits to help teach his class. Michael Britt, a professor at Marist college in upstate New York, posts real world examples of the material he is teaching to Snapchat. His students can view those examples outside of class, and in a medium to which they already pay close attention to. NPR found that many of the students thought the Snaps were helpful and aided in their understanding of the course material.

This makes sense to me, because new information is best processed in a medium where the learner is actively paying attention, or has behavior to support the processing of new information. however this is just one example of a positive use for the app, in a sea of scandal, and less than responsible uses for Snapchat that many people are familiar with. the article explains that there are many school districts that deny access to services like Snapchat on their school networks, but the article maintains that some of those districts are keeping a watch for viable reasons to re-evaluate those restrictions.

I chose to highlight this article because it reminds me how important to me it is to always be searching for positive educational uses for technology. It is easy to misuse technology, and be irresponsible with new software or systems. Just as it is easy to find innovative solutions to long standing questions using the same technological tools. Just like a hammer can be used for creation and destruction, new technologies can provide just what might be needed to help with the learning process, we just need to be creative enough to find them.

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