Computers and video equipment often crash.

The biggest frustration I have is that students are slow to adapt to what I expect them to do with technology. It is a barrier to them not a stepping stone to better learning. They need to be constantly reminded of the need to use technology and be given ample examples and exercises to do so. I had one failure, students refused to do the work I assigned and they took the F for the assignment instead of doing it. I know this has happened at another campus. Students will be students and have free will. They must be allowed to fail. However, we must not let them control how we structure the curriculum. Students are more conservative than physical chemists with respect to what they expect to do in a course. I have been all to glad to give up viscosity measurements to replace it with a molecular modeling activity in the p-chem lab.

I also failed when choosing a computer to use in the lab. This was a while ago and I was much less experienced then. I failed in some of my software choices. This too was due to lack of experience. After all experiments fail. We examine why and then move on to the next experiment.

I guess one should not try to bite off more than one can chew. This for sure will lead to failure.

I don't think I have had any failures, but you do learn about what works and what doesn't related to the specifics of what you are trying to deliver.