Before we look at today’s online teaching tool called Future Me, I was reminded by one of the readers of this blog of a post I had written back in March last year looking at how much influence technology has on learning. It is similar to my post at the beginning of this series. I am sure you will find it an interesting read and will hopefully raise some questions for you to consider.
One of my favourite free tools I use with my students is Future Me. Future Me is a simple online program that allows you to send yourself an email in future. You simply type in your email and set the date and Future Me takes care of the rest for you.
My students use Future Me to:
Set goals and send them to the future as a way of being reminded what their goals were.
- Make predictions about what they will learn
- Remind themselves of habits they want to change or new things they would like to learn
One of the reasons I like Future Me is because it activates one of the greatest factors of intrinsic motivation; that is goal setting. Future Me acts as a fun program that allows you to set goals and then check your progress after a defined amount of time. Another reason that I like Future me is that it is not just an educational tool – you can use it to send yourself funny messages, reminders etc
How to use Future Me:
- Go to futureme.org
- Type in your email address, subject and email content
- Select the date you want the email to be delivered on (must be at least one month in the future)
- Click submit
A couple of points to consider:
- You should always make your emails private. If they don’t they will appear on the right hand side of the screen
- The emails on the right are occasionally inappropriate for students. I tend not to point out the fact that the emails are there and most students don’t bother to read them.
Let me know how you go with this great free tool
