These routers have changed the way i look at things the technology has moved so far….

I’ll also point out that many instructors who teach with clickers find themselves “covering” just as much content (that is, achieving as much breadth), just doing so in a different way, a way that provides depth as well.

Other instructors who use clickers are just find sacrificing a little breadth for a lot of depth. As Assaf points out, there’s an optimization problem here. I think it’s important to assess just how “deep” your students are going when you increase the “breadth” of a course. Often, it’s not very deep at all.

Finally, I’ve got to step up and defend PowerPoint! Well, at least a little. Check out Garr Reynolds’ ideas in his book, Presentation Zen, and his blog of the same name:

http://www.presentationzen.com/

If you think of a PowerPoint slideshow as complementing one’s verbal presentation–and not the other way around–then PowerPoint can be a very effective way to enhance one’s presentation.

For instance, when I give a presentation on how people learn, I show this image:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/pipeapple/3071402405/

I use it to make the point that just as we don’t really know what’s inside of a laptop without x-raying it, we also don’t really know how our students are making sense of what we’re teaching them unless we try to “uncover” what and how they’re learning (usually through formative assessment).

The striking visual image helps make my point more memorable. At least, I think it does!

I’m a big advocate of clickers as a low-barrier way to change up the classroom structure — when used well!