The conventional way to plan your teaching is to follow these steps in sequence:
- prepare the situation and setting - what are you teaching and who is your audience?
- create your goals/educational objectives
- choose the methods and tools needed to meet those goals
It's a tried and tested approach that is used to good effect by most teachers. The approach could easily be called a "ready, aim, fire" approach.
But every now and then, especially in this age of rapid technological advances, it would be beneficial to jumble up this approach somewhat. Sometimes something comes along that is so exciting, so much fun, or is so compelling that it would be great to use it in your work as a teacher, even though it may not fit the methods you'd planned. Perhaps there are things so compelling that you should use them as teaching tools even if at first glance they don't seem to fit what you're teaching.
In this case, you might discover some fantastic piece of technology that you'd love to use in class, and then shape the lesson around that. We might call this the "ready, fire, aim" method of teaching. Unconventional, I know. You're supposed to choose the tools to do the job once you know what "the job" actually is! Here, we are selecting the tools and then finding a job that fits those tools! But in doing so, we experience the following benefits:
- We get to use something we are enthusiastic about. And we know our enthusiasm transfers to our students.
- We introduce up to the minute technology to our students. This is now's technology, not yesterday's.
- We make use of teaching tools of a dramatic and exciting nature.
- We revive and refresh the teaching process.
When new technology emerges, there is only a small window of opportunity - a small period of time during which it is exciting and compelling. This means you need to act quickly to incorporate it into your teaching and take advantage of its newness.
I'm not suggesting that you use the "ready, fire, aim" method every day, but once in a while it will inject a fresh dose of enthusiasm into your class.