Primary Pad

So working in groups...

The first thing I want to address about group work is how interesting it is to hear and see all of the different perspectives and ideas about a given assignment. Like for this weeks assignment, there were members of our group that were looking at a variety of different aspects of BYOD. I can think of a few off of the top of my head, how technology would change various classic works (by either adding technology to a given passage or taking it away), we also talked about the possible inequity that technology can create in the classroom and how we might find literature that would fit this specific purpose, we also discussed different texts. What kind of literature should we use? Articles on BYOD? Fiction? Nonfiction? Futuristic? Literature with zero technology such as "Hills Like White Elephants" or literature jam packed with technology?

Needless to say the class period went by very quickly and lots of ideas were thrown around. It was difficult to figure out what kind of lesson plan we would create, barely knowing what text we wanted to use and what question to focus on. This is where Primary Pad and technology itself came in handy. We simply decided that we would each write our own lesson plan. We each focused on what we thought the assignment was, BYOD. We were then able to have every single idea down, in writing, visible to see, no longer abstract. That was the most helpful part of Primary Pad, instead of us each talking about our ideas out loud and trying to understand each idea and how they would play out we actually had a tangible representation of how that idea would play out. We were then able to pick and choose parts of each lesson plan, putting aspects together with a chosen text to create one coherent class period. We were each then able to give our approval.

Primary Pad was able to save us a lot of time that we would have spent discussing vague concepts. It gave us a chance to set a deadline for when our ideas were to be in by and a chance to finally comprehend each of the ideas. Class time just seemed a little bit chaotic between trying to understand what exactly the assignment was, how we would tackle it, and what ideas we would use. Through Primary Pad and e-mail we were able to correspond and organize our thoughts. The actual assignment on BYOD aside, this was a helpful exercise and taught me a lot about the benefits of technology for group projects.