Too often we get bogged down in a love affair with tools, devices and apps. Sure, it's easy to get inspired by tools that make us utter "that's funky", "this does this" and "Wow! Look at that"...Such thinking can be very seductive.
Techno tools are wonderful! So much is at our fingertips and so many little bits of software and gadgets help us to do things that 5 or even 2 years ago we would have thought impossible. But concentrate on this at the peril of real learning because a love affair with the technology, without the scaffolding of learning and pedagogy, is ad hoc and, at best just more colourful or shiny but in no way deeper or more powerful or sustainable.
So, let's reframe the discussion and thinking about technology use in teaching and learning and make it about the Verbs and not the Nouns as Prensky says (http://marcprensky.com/verbs-and-nouns/ )
When we refocus our thinking this way, we concentrate on the LEARNING - the collaboration, the creation, the communication instead and we can also be more effective in generating interest and creating that all-too-elusive hook for those colleagues of ours more reluctant to use digital technologies.
That way we avoid the empty bells and whistles of techno bling NOUNS in our classrooms and maintain authentic, relevant and rigorous learning environments with an emphasis on the VERBS.
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