So today is the day.  I get a smart phone.  What do I expect from this?  Nothing.  What do I hope for?  Increased keeping in touch with people.  I know it won't happen.

People claim that to keep in touch with them, you need to do it the way everyone else does.  First it was email.  I nearly lost a friend because I wanted to stick to talking on the phone.  He wanted to converse via email.  So in the interest of maintaining connections, I relented.  We drifted apart anyway due to other forces.

Then there was facebook.  I relented with that and I do keep in touch with some people that way but it is only via the computer.  No face to face interaction results from this medium.

I do not text.  I have a flip phone.  However, the parents insist I get a smart phone now that the flip is not usable in Europe.  (I travel a lot.)  I walked up to the store with a sense of dread and apprehension on Tuesday.  Apparently, we get our phones today.  The fantasy?  I announce I got the phone and some of my favourite people will ask for my number so we can text and keep in touch, leading to hanging out, going on adventures and deep talks accompanied by cups of tea or coffee.  The expected reality?  I announce the acquisition of said phone and I hear crickets.  Everyone wants interaction with others, just not me.  Unless they need a favour or have a question about some photo equipment.  Once I have been of service, crickets...

So what does this have to do with teaching?  It reflects what I anticipate this coming year with the bring your own device policy.  I fear we will be drifting to question and answer sessions and critiques done anonymously on our devices rather than face to face and human interaction.  I plan on doing more face to face interaction type stuff this year in the classroom to combat this.  Feedback from a former student is that he would have benefited from more critiques in preparation for his college course.  I heard him loud and clear.  I hated doing critiques because it was like pulling teeth.  Absolute torture.  Forget that.  If the kids can successfully answer a journal question behind the protection of a keyboard and monitor, they can deal with a critique.  They have the words.  They just need to find a way of letting them out via the mouth, not the keyboard.  I might also reintroduce presentations on artists and movements.  I don't know. 

All I know is people think they are keeping in touch via a Snapchat streak or a DM on Instagram.  And I feel lonely with no face to face interaction.