iPod Classroom (#2)

In my point of view, I think that I would learn well using an iPod, if only I had one. Learning with an iPod gives the students the ability to multi-task. They can do units while being in a seminar at the same time. Also with the iPod, the student is able to pause, rewind or repeat what the teacher is saying. It’s a great idea for a school such as Mary Ward. But there is a problem with this idea. In order to learn from the video or audio in the iPod, the teacher must tape and record and check to see if they have missed anything. In addition, if the teachers have many seminars then the result is that they would have to record a lot of times, every week! Mary Ward's system is completely fine and it doesn't need to be replaced by the iPod learning technique.

I think that Mary Ward should not embrace such technology for education even though it is an interesting idea. There are little advantages and many disadvantages to this. Some advantages are teachers can record the seminar once and not worry if a student missed a mandatory seminar because they can give them the file. Another advantage is that the teacher can upload the file onto e-class and not be bugged to know when another seminar will be offered. Disadvantages to this method are that students can use this as another excuse to procrastinate. Students can also pretend to look like they're watching a seminar on their iPod when in fact they can be watching a video unrelated to education or just listening to music and slacking off.