Digital learning is a modern phenomenon that brings with it a host of benefits; however, it is not without its share of pitfalls. I’ve shared some of my personal experiences with digital learning in this blog previously, in the post “The Benefits Of Online Learning.” In that post, I mentioned that I had a poor experience in the past with an online Physics course, and I mentioned that most of my other experiences have been positive. While this is still true, I’d like to highlight some additional specific examples to compare.
One of the worst types of digital learning that I’ve
experienced in recent memory is, collectively, the annual trainings that I must
complete as a teacher each year. There
is a considerable amount of bias that goes into this judgment, though, because
these trainings are created well—they present the required content in an
efficient way, accompanied by an assessment at the end. However, I don’t feel as if I am learning
anything new when I click through the slides and let the videos play on mute
while I multitask (as I am currently doing).
For the simple reason that no learning is happening, I have to pronounce
them ineffective and pointless. Because
these training requirements are largely based on state and federal
requirements, there is little room to make changes for relevance; in my opinion
the best way would be to increase time between required training from one year
to three or five years. However, the
creators of the trainings could add in a question to the assessment that poses
a hypothetical situation which is more specific to each teacher’s own
classroom. For example—since I teach in
a high school, the training about “blood borne pathogens” might have a hypothetical
situation about a scenario in a high school.
One of the best types of digital learning (other than
these LDT courses which I’ve discussed in previous posts) came about after
teachers had to scramble to find resources for teaching from home during
COVID-19. Prior to this time, I’d used
the website teacher.desmos.com for pre-made activities for my students, but did
not expend time and effort to learn how to edit the activities. However, the demands of distance learning put
pressure on me to find or create lessons that supported my students—so I
started combing through all of the resources available, both from the Desmos
site itself and on “How To” YouTube videos, and slowly taught myself how to
code using their platform. This was very
exciting to me because I felt like I was learning a brand new and immediately
applicable skill that I’d never had before, and my students benefitted from
it. Even though there was no course or
instructor, I was absolutely learning in a digital environment and building
meaningful skills (that I still use today in my in-person classroom).
When looking at these two experiences in particular, one
brazen theme about learning is clear: regardless of the context or structure, I
value (and I am passionate about) information that brings me new skills. Information for information’s sake does not
satisfy me as learning; however, if it brings with it actionable steps that
lead to new skills—especially skills that can be implemented to support
personal or professional goals—then I will be engaged and motivated to succeed.
