You see a new teaching idea and immediately picture how it could fit your course. A few days later, another tool looks promising. Soon the class has several new routines, and you're spending more time explaining the system than teaching the topic.
The handbook cautions against changing too much without a clear need. Course improvement is worth doing. Give each change a job before asking students to learn another process.
Name the problem first
Are students struggling to interpret evidence, find instructions, or use feedback? Write the problem in terms you can observe. 'The course needs more technology' doesn't explain what students need to do differently.
A clearer question might lead to a simpler solution than the tool that caught your attention.
Check the current approach
Look at student work, feedback, and the instructions already in place. An existing activity may need a clearer prompt or more practice time. You don't have to replace the whole structure to fix one difficult step.
Preserve the parts of the course that are working.
Consider the cost for students and for you
A change can require accounts, training, access, troubleshooting, and a new grading routine. Ask whether those demands are justified by the learning purpose. Follow the relevant institutional requirements for tools and course design.
Students experience the whole collection of course systems, even when each addition looks small to the instructor.
Make the smallest useful change
Try an adjustment with a clear scope where appropriate. Decide what evidence would help you assess it and when you'll review that evidence. Avoid introducing several changes at once if you need to understand which one addressed the issue.
This doesn't mean postponing a necessary correction. It means matching the size of the change to the problem.
Keep a short change log
Record the issue, your decision, and what you observed afterward. Note what you want to keep, revise, or stop. That log helps when you teach again and when you explain your instructional decisions in a review.
You don't need to call every adjustment an innovation. Clear reasoning is valuable on its own.
Decide what would make you stop using the change
Before a trial, identify what you'd need to see to retain, revise, or abandon it. If the new activity requires substantial setup but doesn't address the original difficulty, what simpler approach could you return to? Planning that possibility makes the trial an inquiry rather than a commitment you must defend afterward.
Consider the students' whole route through the task. A tool may make one step easier while adding confusion elsewhere. Look at instructions, access, preparation, participation, and feedback together instead of judging only the most attractive feature.
Follow institutional requirements before adopting a tool, especially where student information, access, or additional costs are involved. A promising teaching idea still needs an appropriate way to be used. If the requirements can't be met or the learning benefit remains unclear, keep working on the underlying problem. You can take improvement seriously without making every appealing product part of the course.
Before adopting the next appealing idea, complete three sentences: 'Students need help with ___. This change would help by ___. I'll check it through ___.' If those answers are still vague, pause and examine the problem a little longer.
Adapted from The New Faculty Handbook by Zafer Unal, pp. 59-60.
