When Is Going For The Cool Factor OK?

My first thought when a teacher came to me about publishing a book to iBooks was, "that sounds cool." And it is a cool idea. It also gives students a wider audience, gets them excited about the project and could give them added motivation to do well, it also teaches them to publish, and not hand in their work.

For me though, it was cool. It was the win. The kind of project I want now because I know other teachers will notice and come to work with me.

Is it the best way to share student work? Probably not.

As you can see from this exchange with the SIS coaching team, their advice was steering me away from this project. And I agree that technology should be used just because it's there.

But still, I think there can be valid reasons for using tools just for the coolness factor - and while I probably would have steered me away from using iBooks as well, I think my reason of wanting a win to help attract teacher is a good reason to use it. You can't attract bees with vinegar -- and telling teachers that their reasons for using technology is not sound will not win over many people.

I am torn though.

If nothing else, hopefully this experience will help me to try to dig deeper when teachers want to use a certain app and I think I will think twice about when and how I steer willing teachers away from what they want to do.