This week the Times ran an article about the use of clickers at Northwestern University.

The article points out a couple of interesting "lesson's learned" from both faculty and student perspectives.

Faculty appreciate the fact that clickers can increase students' "understanding of material that may otherwise be conveyed in traditional lectures" and that clickers have "made it harder for them to respond to text messages, e-mail and other distractions" in the wired classroom.

Students report that clickers reinforce "what you're supposed to be doing as a student" and they also feel a freedom to engage in conversation about things they get "wrong" if they learn that the rest of the class is equally confused.

CCNMTL has written about clickers in the past and our educational technologists are eager to discuss how faculty might use technologies like this in their teaching.