Effective Technologies to Enhance Student and Faculty Learning

Technology continues to transform the way educators teach and students learn. In fact, one key trend noted in the 2012 Horizon Report is that individuals “expect to be able to work, learn, and study whenever and wherever they want to” (Johnson, Adams, and Cummins, 2012, p. 4). To this end, the challenge for educators is to stay current with Web 2.0 technologies that allow for more interactive and mobile learning. One way to learn about new technologies is by instituting an on-going program that enables faculty to share new and emerging methods with colleagues. While we all have our own methods and techniques to present course information and engage students, we can be even more successful by a continued open dialogue with other educators. According to Wenger (2006), individuals become a Community of Practice (CoP) when they come together for the purpose of “collective learning in a shared domain” (para. 3).

We will share with our audience a few methods that we employ to provide faculty an opportunity to share best practices college wide, as well as on a smaller scale in our student writing center and Composition Department.