3/14/08

One of my first breakthroughs with wiki writing was in a computer I was teaching, a typical set of students, some had MySpace pages, some weren't sure how to turn on the computer. So when the class started, and hearing the expected question, "how do I get on the Internet?" I was intimately aware of the dilemma. I could fell my frustration pressure points quickly kicking in -- my grand plan for the next two hours on manipulating white space was in grave jeopardy. I wanted to use examples on my blog to illustrate various layouts, to answer questions on an online worksheet. Half the class was answering the questions the other half staring at the screen, giving up before the lesson even started.

I designed the blog so that students could walk into class, get online, and do the warmup exercise with very little supervision. My vision for my computer classes is for students to access my blog, follow instruction on the most recent entry, do an activity that will stimulate students to think about the topic for the class, leading into me modeling the lesson, resolved by the last part of the blog entry -- the homework assignment, requiring each student to upload their work to their personal wiki page. And in the beginning of the next class, while everybody is working on the warmup, I'm clicking through the wiki pages, assessing everybody's work.

But as is often the case in computer classes, a quarter of the students don't know how to open FireFox. And my anxiety immediately rose, triggered by past failures, where I'm running around the room, madly trying to convey how to cut and paste to students in the farthest corners, meanwhile, the students I am wedging myself around are waiting for further instructions, Googling the most recent Nike kicks mpegs.

Teaching computer skills in a heterogeous classroom is the most common environment in many academic institutions -- most degree programs only require one computer class. Teaching "all-in-on" computer courses, as you might imagine, is often an exhausting task -- trying to bring everyone to the same skill level is a daunting task. And I've done it enough to be acutely conscious of when the dilemia is eternally recurring again.

http://www.innovateonline.info/index.php?view=article&id=423&action=article

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