Innovation and Success

“A way of seeing is also a way of not seeing.” Kenneth Burke

  As we move forward as a technologically advanced society the sources influencing our daily choices become increasingly complex. While our constant interaction with technology keeps us informed and updated with local and global events, we run the risk of being influenced in previously unforeseen ways. Critically examining information is a key value I stress in my Persuasion and Media course.

As an instructor, innovation in the classroom means learning new ways to connect with and reach students so lessons deeply resonate and continue to foster learning long after the course has ended. One of the greatest challenges of teaching involves locating strategies to help students fully grasp complex and unfamiliar ideas. When talking about the relationship between communication, persuasion, and digital technology one innovative assignment helps students gain a practical understanding of how historically persuasive strategies are being activated today.

The final essay for students of Persuasion and Media is a 24-hour screen technology detox assignment. For this assignment, students are asked to avoid all smart screen technology for 24 continuous hours, including: smartphones, smartwatches, televisions, tablets, and any other internet connected device. Students are required to keep a journal for that 24-hour period to make note of changes in their daily routine. The journal also helps students become more intuned with their noticing. After the 24-hours, I ask students to wait one week before writing their response paper. This allows for recovery time from the trauma of removing all screens from their lives.

Students are then required to write a 3-5-page paper, detailing how their experience of the day-to-day changed from removing all of digital information. Additionally, they are required to make connections between social norms, screen technologies, and how our focus on these technologies makes influence/persuasion omnipresent. This assignment empowers students to become critically aware of the nuances of influence and how individuals are sub-consciously effected. Students have referred to this assignment as  “eye-opening” and “like a rebirth.” One student even compared it to “a spiritual awakening.”