I’m currently teaching two sections of the same introductory GIS course, one face-to-face (F2F), and one online. This morning I tried a little experiment – I taught my regular F2F class in a lecture hall as usual, but I had a live webinar version of it online at the same time. It went remarkably well, so I thought I would briefly explain what I did, why, and how.
What I did:
Students that did not attend the live lecture (in either section of the course) could see whatever I showed using the projector in class, which included PowerPoint slides, web pages, and a live demo of ArcGIS ModelBuilder. They could hear me talking, but could not see me (no separate video feed of the instructor). Besides this main window, there were two smaller windows, one for questions, and one for chat (these were not visible to the F2F students). I recorded the entire two-hour lecture, broken into two parts, that was then posted online for students who couldn’t watch live, as well as for those who may want to refer to it again later. The students who attended the webinar version were from both sections of the course (I did a quick poll before class started).
Why I did it:
There were three main reasons why I wanted to try this. I have been thinking about trying this hybrid approach for a while, but the current impetus was that I have a guest speaker coming to class next week. After I invited him, I realized that I couldn’t ask him to do what I have been doing up until now, namely recording a separate podcast version for my online students and then teaching the lecture to my F2F section. I wanted to have a way to capture him speaking in class in one shot. Second, I have been a little uneasy about the fact that my online students were not benefiting from the spontaneous questions, discussions, demos, and announcements that would come up in class, and I wanted to capture that. Third, my in-class attendance has dropped off dramatically in the past couple of lectures (I’m guessing this is due to the F2F students having access to the online lecture podcasts) and I wanted to have another way for them to participate if they can’t (or won’t) attend in person.
How I did it:
Aside from the usual software (PowerPoint, using presenter view; ArcGIS; Chrome browser) I used Adobe Connect for the webinar. I have used this for about two years for holding online office hours, so I was quite comfortable with setting it up. I presented using my own laptop (Dell Latitude E6520) and used my own newly-purchased wireless lavalier microphone. After consulting with my amazingly helpful colleagues through the U of T Educational Technology Interest Group, as well as a professional sound engineer (a friend of a friend), I decided to go with the Sennheiser ew100 G3 system. It worked very well, although the sound today was a bit muddy. I think this is mainly a matter of my learning the correct settings, especially mic sensitivity. I can also increase the sound quality settings in Adobe Connect next time, which takes a bit more bandwidth, but may be worth trying. I used my iPad (3rd generation) with the Adobe Connect app so I could see how the webinar looked from the students’ perspective, and it was easier for me to check for online questions without having to keep switching windows on my laptop. I didn’t go so far as to monitor the audio this way, but will do so next time (at least to check the quality).
How it went:
Really well! I had about 15 students watching online, and they were able to ask questions and use the chat window to talk with each other (this was minimal and not distracting). I got some very positive feedback and will definitely be doing this again. I’m really pleased that my online students now have the option of participating in a live lecture.
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