Critical Thinking Paper

Kristin Hill
September 7, 2009
English W200
Critical Thinking Paper

Before reading this article I really hadn’t ever thought of “technology penalties” before. I am constantly hearing people curse technology and complain about different types of technology. After reading this article I have a better understanding of some specific reasons why technology can be a burden to some. Like the article stated, “technology has many benefits but is in particularly looking at the penalties.” When I first read the article I kept questioning certain parts of the article because I wanted to argue the fact that there are many great things about technology; I had to constantly keep reminding myself that the article wasn’t saying that, it was only pointing out the penalties. There are a lot of areas I completely agree with in this article, but there are other parts I still disagree with.

The main idea of the whole paper was to discuss the different types of technology penalties. According to the article, “the technology penalty is what happens when you do something using technology that you could do easier, quicker, or more efficiently without using technology.” When I first read that I immediately wondered what could we do that could be so much quicker without technology? I have always grown up having a computer and all different types of technology around me my whole life, so when I first read this I was very interested to see what types of penalties technology has. Some examples of technology penalties were: Emailed assignments, using PDA’s or online datebooks, Photoshop or any new software, Smartboard, online gradebooks, Distance Learning, and Laptops in the Classroom. After reading the explanation I almost agree with every single example given. It makes sense now as to why these things would take more time for teachers and in some instances students too.

It seemed to me that this article was based on the viewpoints from teachers. But, just because it’s a technology penalty for the teacher, doesn’t necessarily make it a technology penalty for students does it? This question was really on my mind a lot as I was reading through this article because I was seeing how, yes, it can be a penalty for the teacher, but some of these things are very beneficial for the student. For example, using online gradebooks is a technology penalty because technically the teacher is doing the job twice by having to keep a paper and online gradebook. I do agree that doing any task twice is obviously going to take twice as long to complete the task, but the online gradebook helps students because they automatically know their grade and don’t have to constantly keep asking the teacher for their grade. See to me I kind of disagree with the online gradebook being a technology penalty because I think in the long run doing the task twice is going to save the teacher time. I think this because if every student continually keeps asking to know what their grade is, which is sometimes 20-30 different times, the teacher is going to have to go look the grade up and report the grade back to the student(s). That is going to take a lot of extra time as well, constantly having to look grades up. But, if there is an online gradebook that is visible to the student then that will eliminate students from continually asking.

There was only one other point in the article that I disagreed with and that was using a calendar on a computer or PDA. Yes, this may be considered a technology penalty for some who aren’t computer savvy. And the author has valid points as to why this can by a technology penalty, but in my experience I always keep my cell phone and computers turned on. If I don’t have my laptop near me, 100% of the time I do have my cell phone on me. I have an iPhone, so it’s basically like a computer at your fingertips at all times. For me to open my calendar up, add a couple dates, or look up a date is a lot more efficient and a lot quicker for me then to sit down and hand write all my dates into a pocket datebook. Firstly, because I don’t know where I would keep a pocket datebook because my phone is always in my pocket and secondly, after sitting down and writing tons of dates into a pocket planner, I know that would make my hand hurt when I could just type it into my phone just as quickly with no pain, in my opinion.

All the other penalties I completely agree with, and probably would have never considered them penalties before I read this article because I am so consumed with being around technology all the time. One thing I found extremely shocking, in particular, was grading by hand is much quicker than having students email their assignments. I do think this could be an instance where it’s a technology penalty for the teacher and not the student, but it makes sense. Although, it may be easier and more environmentally friendly just to email an assignment I can see where it is going to take a lot more time to sit and grade a paper that’s on a computer screen versus if it’s on a hard copy right in front of you. Another point I completely agreed with was the new software that’s constantly coming out is a technology penalty. Everyday it seems like there is some new technology or some new update for technology you already own. So, all the time teachers and students have to readjust to new things, which take a lot of extra time instead of just sticking to what we already have. This is something I find myself always complaining about because although I consider myself computer savvy, I hate having to spend the extra time to install or wait for the update to download and then figure out the new processes associated with that new software or update. Then, for people that aren’t familiar with the new technology or software, it’s just going to take them that much longer to learn how to use it.

At the end of the article it states, “The way to deal with the technology penalty is to know that it exists, to expect it, to plan for it, and to document it.” This especially stuck out to me because technology isn’t going away, we are going to be faced with technology penalties if we haven’t been already, and we are going to have to just deal with them whether we like it or not. I know after reading this article there are going to be some things, I as a teacher, do differently in my classroom. Now that I know of some of the different technology penalties, I can try to eliminate them in my classroom. Also, now that I am familiar with some of the technology penalties I can already see that in some classes I’m taking right now which teachers are and which aren’t familiar with different technology penalties. There is this one class, in particular, that I was in where the professor always hand graded every assignment, did not use an online gradebook, and who would only answer questions face to face. After reading this article, it would seem to me he was trying to avoid the technology penalty that all those things possessed. Although, I probably won’t avoid every single penalty as a teacher, now that I know of some of the different ones, I will try to eliminate some.

First Post

Hello, I am Kristin Hill. I'm 21 years old and I 'should' be a junior at IUPUI but for some reason they have me down as a sophomore. When I graduate I want to be an English teacher. Hopefully in the next 10 years I'll get married and start my own family. Right now I live at home, in Crawfordsville, and commute to Indy twice a week for school. I live at home and have 2 younger sisters; Lacie - 17 and Olivia - 9. It's very interesting. Currently I'm working at Ace Hardware for a little extra income. When I'm not at school, doing homework, or working I like to hang out with my friends and just try to relax and get some 'me' time.

I didn't have much trouble setting this blog up. I have used similar things in the past. Blogger seemed fairly easy to set up and seems fairly easy to use. My advice to those that are having difficulties setting their blog up would be not to stress; just go to the homepage and carefully look over all the information there. It should be easy to find.

I look forward to reading everyone else's post. But for now, I'm off...