A Note on Teaching with Technology in the English Department

Technology, I believe, is neither sublime nor infernal. I am skeptical of (though interested in) sweeping claims related to technology. Some hold, for instance, that hypertext (the linking structure of the web) encourages students to think in a less linear way; debates then spark over the question of whether this is to be lauded or deplored. In relation to teaching, however, I believe that a sophisticated multimedia presentation or an elegant course Web site is simply a tool--something like a really smart piece of chalk.

In an English department, in particular, technology may seem superfluous. Other disciplines have been transformed by technology; in Architecture, for instance, computer-assisted design has swept the field, and architects find that they have little choice but to learn the new ways of doing things. Changes in English have been subtler. E-mail has replaced memos and mailboxes as the primary medium of interdepartmental communication, word-processing programs are now de rigueur--but reading, discussing, and writing are much what they ever were.

Why bother to think about technology and teaching, then? Because it looks good on a curriculum vitae? Because tenure review committees like it? Because the students expect it? Because everyone else is doing it? Because the technology is, well, fun? (For some, I assure you, it is.) Sure--we all have impure motivations sometimes, and I must say that I will always think it better to learn something new for a bad reason than to learn nothing new for the best of reasons.

But the high-minded reason to think about technology and teaching is also perfectly valid: technology can help us improve as teachers. Those same problems always recur:  How do I get my students to concentrate on and understand the text? How do I encourage them to pipe up in class? How do I convey a sense of what this period in history was like? How do I help my students improve their writing?

Technology for technology's sake? Elsewhere, no doubt, in some Silicon Valley Grosvenor Gallery, but not here. Technology for teaching's sake.

After using technology in several of my own classes, and after helping several faculty members and graduate instructors to use it in theirs, I have come to this conclusion: technology can offer new solutions to the same old problems of teaching, but it cannot necessarily offer better ones.

Sometimes, however, it can and does. You might even get fond of it. Care to find out?

--Amanda French, TTSP