The age-old question of how to keep learners engaged is being answered by new age answers: augmented reality (AR), virtual reality (VR), and mixed reality (MR). With these emerging technologies, topics come to life for students. The experiences are novel, learners have control over their interactions, and can therefore become immersed in their experience.
Without any equipment except my cell phone, I tapped into the free Google Expeditions app and invited a virtual skeleton into my office:
“We can just record my existing PowerPoint slides.”
The phrase always sends shivers down my spine. Not because recording PowerPoint slides isn’t effective, as in some situations it can still be useful, but because of the seemingly flippant attitude of the “just” part. If only it were that easy, and a recorded PowerPoint was the end-all solution for online learning.
This is always where we start our conversation that, in essence, defines my ethics of video lectures in instructional design. This is a very loose framework, and not necessarily based on any particular theory I’ve encountered, but rather through observations of multitudes of online courses using various approaches to content delivery and seeing what works based on the course and the context. Simply deploying a “video” isn’t really that simple.
Recently, I heard a phrase that I think sums this up nicely: “You haven’t yet mastered a tool until you understand when not to use it.” Continue reading
Have you ever made a lecture video? If so, have you watched it? What do you think about your pacing, the environment you shot in, and your performance?
More importantly, what do you think your students would say about your videos? Would they say you’re:
Boring?
Unfocused?
Hard to see or hear?
In a distracting environment?
Verbose?
Fear not, even with the driest of materials, you can still put on a scintillating lecture. Today I’ll share with you some tried and true techniques to get the most out of your filming time, and to improve the end product both for you and for your students. Continue reading
Few teaching tasks are as loathsome as re-recording videos for your online course.
In fact, I’ve been trying to come up with potential comparisons for about 20 minutes, and the closest I’ve come is the sinking feeling in your stomach when you survey the stack of final papers/projects that loom before you during finals week. While a root canal might be preferable to re-recording course videos, here are two practical recommendations that helped me when I set out to complete this undesirable task: Continue reading
From MIT’s open courseware to the proliferation of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC), I have seen a lot efforts being taken towards blending advancements in technology with the goodwill of making knowledge accessible to all. As an online learning professional, I have been following reports and research on the impact of open education, but never before have I been so stunned by the results of a report. The report, originally published in the weekly edition of Chinese Youth newspaper in Dec 12, 2018, was about a program that provides a full-day live broadcast of a prestigious high school to 248 high schools in the rural areas of China.
Instead of listening to their own instructors, students in the rural or “far-end” high schools watch a live broadcast of instruction from a high school in Chengdu, the capital city of Sichuan province. According to the report, the launch of project faced strong resistance from teachers in these rural schools. They protested by tearing books apart. Some teachers even took a whole week off and left students “staring” at the screen by themselves.
With increasing technologies being used to facilitate global learning experiences (GLE) and guest participants in the classroom, technical difficulties are inevitable (as with any technology). Such unplanned technological mishaps often lie beyond the control of participants and instructors, so as with any collaborative effort to meet, it is best to prepare for common scenarios.
Consider the following scenario: You have invited a remote guest speaker in Germany for an hour-long class lecture. Since this lecture is a big deal due to the labor-intensive logistics planning (which include coordinating time zone differences, course scheduling, language coordination, appointments with the instructional technology support at your institution, and much emphasis for participation from your students), you are very much hoping that the videoconferencing tool you’ve selected will work.
Despite your careful planning, testing, and prior use of the technologies at hand, sometimes, things just won’t work out. When things do not work out, here are some ways to save your videoconferencing event.
You probably asking yourself what do augmented reality (AR)and Korean dramas have to do with each other? Well, in December 2018 Korea debuted a new drama on Netflix, Memories of Alhambra, which revolved around a groundbreaking AR game based on medieval battles in Alhambra. The main character of the drama, Yoo Jin Woo, is a CEO of an investment company that specializes in optical devices. One optical device he creates was a contact lens that allows users to interact with AR content. For Jin Woo, getting his hands on the next big AR game was imperative. This leads to a late night phone call from an AR game creator, Jung Se Joo, telling him they need to meet ASAP otherwise he might sell his game to Jin Woo’s competitor. This gets Jin Woo on plane to Granada, Spain, and thus begins his AR journey.
I frequently work with faculty who want to create a video lecture for an online course using the PowerPoint decks they present in the classroom.
I have misgivings about PowerPoint as a classroom presentation tool to start with (not the least of which is the problem of cognitive load [Mayer1]), but that’s a topic for another discussion. Faculty like them, and an instructional designer (like yours truly) learns to pick their battles.
How present are you in your classes? If you teach face-to-face or hybrid sections, you may have an easier time responding to this question than if you teach fully online. When physically present in the classroom, it’s easy to take it for granted that students are able to see you, hear you, and respond to you. But in a fully online environment, especially one that doesn’t hold real-time sessions, it can be a challenge to establish your presence as the professor.
Enter the weekly video update. The authors of a widely cited article published in The Internet and Higher Education report that asynchronous video “made their instructors seem more real, present, and familiar… similar to face-to-face instruction.” This finding should resonate with instructors, who despite teaching online in increasing numbers still report feeling that online learning is less effective than face-to-face teaching.
I’ve been using Kahoot for several years to create competitive quiz games like 21 blitz for my students. It’s a great tool for reviewing previously covered concepts and breaking up lectures with quick knowledge checks. So, when a colleague encouraged me to check out Poll Everywhere’s new Competitions feature, I was skeptical. 
I have students who literally cheer when I announce that it’s time for a Kahoot quiz. Even hard-to-impress faculty get caught up in the competition during workshops. They overthink their team names, agonize over answer choices, and trash talk their neighbors as points are tallied. I couldn’t possibly abandon Kahoot and run away with another quiz tool after everything we’ve been through, could I?