REmediation, REthinking, REdoing, REeverything

“The world we have created is a product of our thinking. It cannot be changed without changing our thinking.” - Ghandi

Bolter and Grusin remind us, “The word remediation is used by educators as a euphemism for the task of bringing lagging students up to an expected level of performance…” (59). Oddly enough the same word, but pronounced REmediation, has found its way back into the classroom, yet the remedial ones now are the instructors struggling to keep up with evolving classrooms and changing students. Implications of Bolter and Grusin’s remediation in the teaching of writing begin with instructors and the pedagogies developed for classrooms. As instructors we must realize the nature of remediation in the classroom; that remediation of technologies and implementation of said technologies into the classroom changes the teaching environment altogether, beckoning a need for remediation within pedagogies. As technological innovations represent different, revised, and in most cases improved versions of predecessors the pedagogies of tomorrow must represent teaching methods along comparable lines of remediation. We should use the new forms of access, communication, and writing made available to use via advances in technology to every advantage we can conceive within our classrooms. Pedagogies have always evolved, changing to best suit the needs of specific courses and student populations; but in today’s digital age we have an opportunity to redevelop pedagogical methods from the inside out—not just showing change but guiding remediation in education that moves with (rather than struggles to keep up with) remediation in technology.