A blog I always enjoy reading, The Tempered Radical by Bill Ferriter, created a new day to celebrate – Epic Tech Fail Day.  In honor of this day, Bill asked for submissions of tech fails in the classroom.  We’ve all had these experiences.  Internet crashes, computers freezing, and other uncooperative technology that decides to stand still when you are in front of 30 eager students (even though it worked flawlessly when you tested it out just 15 minutes prior).  If an administrator is there to observe, the likelihood of an epic tech fail increases ten fold.  Here are a few of my epic tech fails, as well as some tips to overcome or prevent technology failures in the classroom.  Be sure to visit The Tempered Radical to share some of your own experiences!

Photo by dawnzy58

Skype Epic Tech Fail

After reading books from the 39 Clues Series, as well as Skeleton Creek, my class had a “virtual visit” with Patrick Carman.  His virtual visits are free, so be sure to check it out for your class!  When my class began our Skype session, Patrick Carman couldn’t see us at all!  We just started the conversation anyway.  About 5 minutes into the conversation, the two media center coordinators and I got the video working (Yup, it took three adults to get it working!).  This wasn’t the only fail.  We wanted all of the students visible in the camera, so my class had to scrunch in class picture style – first row sitting on the floor, second row on chairs, and third row standing – to get everyone in the shot.  Imagine this for 30 minutes with a group of fifth graders.

• Tip: This tip applies to all technology – have a backup plan!
• Tip: If possible, just go on with the show.  If you can just hear each other, have a conversation.  If you can just see each other, type your conversation.
• Tip: Enlist help!  Media coordinators are your friends – very, very good friends!

Glogster Epic Tech Fail

At the end of the school year my students created “What I’ve Learned in Fifth Grade” glogs (poster blogs).  One student had a typo when he typed in the web address and a very inappropriate site loaded.  Go figure, I can’t load some educational sites with our school’s firewall, but this site loads.  At least luck was on my side in three ways.  One, the school firewall blocked pictures from loading.  Two, I was standing right next to him when it happened, so I quickly and calmly (at least on the outside) navigated to the correct site.  Three, it all happened so fast, I don’t think he realized what happened.  Or at least I hope.  Thankfully, I do not think the site he navigated to still exists.

• Tip: Create a quick link for students to click on from your classroom website or the desktop.  This can save time, as well as PREVENTS potential epic tech fails resulting from mistyped web addresses.
• Tip: See if the website offers educational accounts or has an education only section.  Glogster has classroom accounts that are just for classroom use.

PhotoBooth Epic Tech Fail

I was excited to use this Mac Software with my fifth graders to create weather forecasts.  Since this program doesn’t require the internet, I decided to move to the auditorium to have more space for my future meteorologists.  After dividing my students into different sections all over the auditorium, hands start to shoot up from all directions.  I quickly realized that although PhotoBooth doesn’t use the internet, my students needed an internet connection to log on to the network in order to open the software.  Yikes!  It took about ten minutes to get an airport set up and a connection running.  In the meantime I had students practice their forecasts without using the laptops.

• Tip: Make sure students have other materials they can use to work on their project even if the technology momentarily fails.  I like to think of technology as the “dangling carrot”.  Students LOVE and CRAVE to use technology, so I use that to my advantage.  I have students to do a lot of work in preparation to using the technology

Writing Project Epic Tech Fail

This didn’t happen to me quite as badly as it did to another teacher in my building.  We have a laptop cart that is shared among classes at my school.  Students often save the projects they are creating on the laptop’s desktop.  Maybe you see where this is going.  On a particular project that took several days to complete, students were finding that their saved files were MISSING!  Some files were found in the trashcan, whereas other files remained mysteriously lost.  This made the project take longer than intended to complete, as well as created some very frustrated students and teachers!

• Tip: Have students save files to a shared folder on the network so you can easily back up all of their files to a flash drive. I contacted my districts tech team to have  a shared folder set up on our school’s network.
• Tip: Have students save their file to a place other than the desktop.
• Tip: Teach students that messing with other people’s files is just as serious as messing with other people’s stuff.  If it is not yours, don’t touch it!

Sansa Fuze Mp3 Players Epic Tech Fail – Averted!

At the end of last school year, I received 4 Sansa Fuze MP3 and Video Players to use in my classroom educationally.  In my excitement, I  downloaded some educational videos and songs onto the devices for my students.   Although I did not anticipate any troubles, I asked a few students to have a “test run” with the Sansa Fuzes.  The directions were simple – “Test these out to see if they work”.  The MP3 players are intuitive to use, but I figured this way I could find out if students would have any difficulties.  It turned out to be just the opposite.  One student seemed t0o engrossed in what should be a song about the water cycle.  It turned out they were using the radio feature.  I didn’t even think about students using the device to find what would likely be the stations their parents don’t let them listen to at home.  Now I know what to disable or ban in order to have effective classroom use of my MP3 players.

• Tip: Have a few students “test out” a technology before using it with the whole class.

Non-Use Epic Tech Fail

I would have to say that the biggest tech fail of all would be not using technology at all in your classroom.

• Tip: Don’t be afraid to try it out!  I find that administration can be supportive, even when things don’t go as planned.  Enlist the help of colleagues, friends, and family.  I can guarantee that almost any teenager you know can be great insight into what technology you can use in your classroom and can likely even tell you how to use it.

As teachers, we get better at what we do by sharing about our own experiences and learning from experiences of others.  If you have any tips or advice, please share!