Digital Pedagogy Unpluged

Digital Pedagogy, you don’t even need a computer?

When I first read this I thought, well I am not a smart man, but digital means binary digits and for that, you need a computer?

As it turns out I was wrong, again. The article Digital Pedagogy Unplugged written by Paul Fyfe, shows different examples of an unplugged digital humanities pedagogy that can be very effective. The different strategies that he touches on include teaching naked, the technology of cultural studies work, text mines and not reading in the digital humanities.

The one that really caught my eye was naked teaching. Naked teaching actually means removing all electronic devices wich in clued computers and projectors. When I read that, I wondered why would you remove such an enormous source of information? Why would you cut your students off from the biggest source of information out there (the Internet)?

Dr. Jose Bowen sparked my interest, he claims that teachers or lectures rely too much on technology to teach, there is no discussion happening, the teacher would just open a PowerPoint and bombard the learners with information. He says that technology need to be a tool not a strategy. By a tool he means that we as an educator are not supposed to give or try to fill our student’s heads with knowledge, because the Internet has a lot more and can relay it much faster than we can. We as educators must help our students sort through all the information out there and think critically about the content. We must facilitate learning.

This does not mean we should start throwing computers out the window, it only means we should start using technology to spark the interests in our students. We must use technology to start conversations, relay new ideas and discuss them. In the article they used an example of a flip classroom, basically you would give out the text or study material before the class and then in class you would discus the content.

In conclusion I will end of with a quote from Mr Benjamin Franklin, “Tell me and I will forget. Teach me and I’ll remember. Involve me and I will learn.”