Although I still consider myself relatively young in my education career (edging on thirteen years in various roles), it’s still astounding the fads that have come and gone. This isn’t anything new in this particular field, but it does teach you an important skill:

Assessing the effectiveness of new tools and ideas.

That’s actually a polite way of saying that it teaches you to have a BS meter that is set on extremely low.

My criteria for anything new always revolves around the question of whether this new idea or tool best serves my students. Some do, some don’t and a few only serve a handful.

However, with the proliferation of the tech industry nabbing our brightest minds, our world right now is flooded with crap we didn’t ask for and mostly don’t need. I mean, does the world really need another mindfulness app?

It’s hard not to get caught up in the marketing hype of some products, only to realize their usefulness is nothing more than novelty that will quickly be abandoned in favour of another shiny product. Or better yet, back to what was working in the first place.

Then, of course, you have the clever ways people bring back extremely old ideas and present them as something ‘new’ as they dress it up slightly different. Education is horrendous for this particular practice and now we’re seeing it everywhere.

Having been caught up in some of these whirlwinds, I’ve taken a step back and armed myself with two tools that are waning in popularity today—patience and careful reflection.

If it’s trying to solve an issue I don’t have, then maybe it’s a novelty I don’t need.