Book Review: Teaching Social Work With Digital Technology

by Stephen P. Cummings, MSW, ACSW, LSW

Teaching Social Work With Digital Technology, by Laurel Iverson Hitchcock, Melanie Sage, and Nancy J. Smyth, CSWE Press, ISBN 978-0-87293-195-4, paperback, Alexandria, VA, 2019, 713 pages, $58.00.

     Digital technology: the phrase encompasses so many things and ideas. Add “Teaching with” and the reader can either be inspired by the possibilities, or get hit with a wave of urgent anxiety (or both). What are the assumptions about my skills? Do my students have more knowledge and confidence than I do? Social workers, especially those who both practice and teach, find themselves at a unique moment in our professional practice, as well as our classrooms. The National Association of Social Workers updated the Code of Ethics with new clauses to emphasize the need for competency in the ethical use of technology. An updated document on Standards of Technology in Social Work Practice, published in 2017, provides even more guidance. Yet these updates can feel like more way-finding without a larger map. How do we translate standards into teaching?

     Fortunately, Teaching Social Work with Digital Technology, an excellent and thorough new reference, arrives at the perfect time. I use the word "thorough" with confidence - this new text speaks to a wide audience. Whether you just signed your first teaching contract, or you’ve been in the classroom for years, this book is for you. Professors Laurel Hitchock, Melanie Sage, and Nancy Smyth have collaborated on a project that provides focus to this current space and time in digital technology, and it provides perspectives on why we need to include technology in our classroom design. Along the way, a few myths are dispensed: your students are not wiser than you in this area, technology is not just “going online” or “distance education,” and teaching with technology does not mean you’re not a people person.

     Full disclosure: I know the authors and consider them colleagues. My connections to Drs. Hitchock, Sage, and Smyth developed in that same virtual space that the authors describe in the book’s preface. “We have no idea how many book collaborations begin on Twitter, but ours is probably not the only one.” As social media’s reach became wider in the last decade, social work educators found each other easily on platforms like Twitter, connecting through phrases like #swtech (an abbreviation for social work technology allowing people to thread their engagements on social media together by applying the “#” symbol, called a hashtag in this context). Through connections like this, social work professionals (including the authors) found each other and began to connect in other ways, including at conferences and other meet-ups. As technology facilitated the relationship among the authors, the plan for this book came about.

     Hitchcock, Sage, and Smyth haven’t merely created a reference book: a clear narrative thread exists, starting with a foundation in digital literacy and pedagogical approaches, and then ethical considerations for teaching with technology. I appreciate how Hitchcock, Sage, and Smyth approach the concept of digital literacy here: technology is ubiquitous, and a majority of people use it in some form. For educators, a robust learning environment requires meaningful applications of technology. As the authors note, “a thoughtful social work educator will not only ask if online education is as good as the traditional seated classroom but will also want to identify the hallmarks of quality social work skill development in any setting.” It’s important to be critical of the assumption that students are more versed in this literacy, even though they may demonstrate skill with one or more aspects of technology. Even the so-called "extremely online" members of our student body "require education, mentoring, and support about how to decontexualize the values of social work” in the context of professional practice.

     While the foundation and narrative for teaching with technology is clearly present, the book is also an excellent reference. The appendices include a series of practical assignments for classroom and field engagement, featuring examples submitted by leaders throughout the continuum of social work education. (The book is something of a Who’s Who in this regard.) The list of lessons includes developing infographics, live Tweeting for social work education, creating and building a field journal website, creating video case presentations, and even an assignment using massive online game World of Warcraft, in an approach to familiarizing students with the culture and norms of gamers.

     A key theme permeates throughout the book: while teaching can sometimes feel isolated between the teacher and students (whether it’s a small seminar or large lecture), teaching with technology requires a level of critical engagement, planning, and delivery that requires interdisciplinary effort. Technology-based pedagogy “supports, encourages, and maybe even demands interdisciplinary collaboration in higher education.” It’s up to social work to take an active lead in the use of technology in higher education; we run a considerable risk that, should we deliberately avoid this need for leadership, institutional administration may direct us to use technology through top-down policies. The authors suggest this puts us in a position of weakness.

     As someone who works in this space of technology and distance education, I concur and assert that while this book arrives at an important time, the premise is nothing new for social workers. We thrive in environments where we emerge as leaders and collaborators. In this sense, technology in higher education is no different from health care practice or policy collaboration.

Stephen P. Cummings, MSW, ACSW, LISW, is a clinical assistant professor at the University of Iowa School of Social Work, where he is the administrator for distance education. He writes the Tech Notes column for The New Social Worker.