Transparent Technology
27 10 2007After reading Will Richardson’s 27 OCT post, I got to thinking about finding and cataloging information online, which was a springboard in my head to one of my greatest priorities in selecting and sticking with software and other systems; this latter piece is what this post is about.
First, some context. I recently had an interesting meeting with the president of a relatively prominent K12 online subscription service. I know that sounds cryptic, but I don’t want to drop names, and I don’t want to seem like I’m taking shots at something that others may find useful.
Anyway, some years ago my district bought a subscription to a web-based system that made a great many promises, and looked very promising — but after fiddling with it for a month or so, I determined that its clunky interface and (IMHO) unreliability made it a waste of time for me. So I stopped using it. Many other teachers did the same. When we were in the final planning stages for Empire I looked at it again, having read about all manner of improvements and such and such — and found it to be the same clunky, unreliable dog. So I decided to ignore it henceforth.
Last week the president of the company visited our district, and Empire, to talk to our IT people, administrators at various levels, and some teachers about how the system could be improved. So while my student teacher did a great job with one of my Government classes, I found myself sitting in a conference room explaining, along with another teacher, why we didn’t like the product, and therefore why we didn’t use it. It boiled down, in large part, to these two issues: the interface & organization weren’t intuitive, and required too much clicking and checking and clicking again — so that made using the system irritating and unnecessarily time-consuming. And second, the product of the system was not always delivered in a form that we found useful, and sometimes was not available at all — hence my comment that it was unreliable. We chose (and still choose) to not use the system at all.
The president listened, and took notes, and asked some questions, and then started to tell us how “easy” the system was, and how well it worked….to which I responded that if it was so easy, we’d have figured it out already. I don’t think this individual got it — you’ve all had that, right? You just know when the listener does not really understand what you’re saying, and what your comments really mean. I, and other teachers on two campuses in our district, had mostly agreed that the system was not easy to use — case closed…regardless of how “easy” the president thought it was, we disagreed. I don’t think that sunk in.
My issue with the service was, and is, this: whether it works or not is irrelevant at this point. I already sunk time into it, and couldn’t get it to do what I needed, in a form that made sense to me, so I dumped it. I have long since found an excellent resource to take its place — and this one is intuitive, reliable, and flexible. So why waste my time? If the technology isn’t transparent, I just don’t have time for it.
When I first started using a computer, it was pre-DOS. The first computer I owned was an Apple IIc (w/128k RAM!!). I remember the non-GUI computing world — I programmed in BASIC and Pascal. I remember word processors that had a steep learning curve to climb before any papers could be typed.
Happily, those days are gone for most users — computers are supposed to be easy for the non-techie. I am a teacher first, and so anything that takes time away from that function, when I need to perform it, is bad. I’ve taken just enough Econ to appreciate the concept of opportunity cost. Thus, my need for transparent technology: tech that’s so intuitive, flexible, and reliable that it fades into the background so my students and I can get down the real business at hand.
I think it’s easy to get caught up in trying to find the latest tech for the classroom — and lose sight of the students in that classroom. If the tech truly improves the quality of the experience and the outcome, use it. If the tech absorbs more resources (in time and effort, at least) than it can add on the end, why bother?
Thoughts?
jdg
You said: “I am a teacher first…”
That is what makes you such an oustanding teacher.
By the way, I completely agree with your synopsis. Technology should be a fluid addition to the classroom, not a burden.
I totally agree with you. There’s so much technology being introduced every minute of every day. It’s important to stay grounded and not to allow yourself to spend countless hours trying to find the latest gadgets. If it doesn’t directly improve teaching and learning, then don’t integrate technology. Successful integration occurs when the technology becomes transparent … another tool to demonstrate knowledge.
Great Post!
Our school is experiencing something similar to this with our new online grading system (Gradequick). It’s not user-friendly or intuitive and as a result, we have a number of teachers struggling to get their grades properly submitted and displayed for students and parents to see. The Gradequick people even sent out a rep to help our faculty with some of the problems and one of the first things he said was, “We have hundreds of schools using our program and 99% of the time, the problem is not with Gradequick, but rather the teachers.” Needless to say, there were a lot of people who took exception to that comment.
As Stephanie mentioned, I am a teacher first, not a IT specialist. If I have to be an IT specialist to figure out your program for use in my classroom, then I’m most likely not going to use it. As they say in the military, Keep It Simple Stupid.
Glad to have you as a member of the Teacher Collaborative. I look forward to any additional thoughts you can add to the topics being discussed there.
I completely agree. My philosophy is that software for the common user (professional 3D animation would be an example of an exception) should not require reading a manual or a guide in order to get things done.
I’m an IT director for a small school that had GradeQuick forced on us because it is supposed to integrate with a clunky web portal called Edline. I *hate* this software. The interface is horrible and clumsy. It feels like something from the early 90s and is not nearly as intuitive as it should be. It feels like it was built to mimic the old paper ledger> This is fine if the goal is to transition long time educators to the digital realm, but it ignores the needs and modern workflow of newer teachers who may never have had to use one. Anyone who has used a spreadsheet will find this program frustrating.
Then on top if it, there is no true integration, just a shortcut button that exports the data to a file and automatically opens up the Edline website to the upload page. Transferring data to/from SchoolMinder is an equally annoying procedure that is clearly a hacked method that was bolted onto an increasingly outdated approach.
The thing many of these legacy companies fail to realize is that for the user, the interface IS the product. It should be seamless and transparent as possible. When is the last time you needed open a book and read the steps for ordering something off of Amazon? Ebay, Youtube, Facebook, etc, just work. Users have gotten used to a certain ease of functionality and for the most part the available actions on such sites are self-evident and easy to use. With “web 2.0″ technologies like ajax, I’m puzzled as to why we don’t hold gradebook software to the same expectations.
Engrade.com is a perfect example of applying the technology to aid the user, rather than expecting the user to bend to the requirements of the programmer. It is by far the best gradebook I’ve tried. Now if only its creators had the chance to apply their software design philosophy to the rest of the student information system pipeline.