Today was the first time FLC held its virtual meeting. We used the Big Blue Button (BBB), a pretty cool conference tool on Canvas… if you know how to use it. Thanks to Marcia and Dawn who helped us navigate the tool. Among the participants were Mary, Alyssa, Janell, and Vicky. It was hilarious at the beginning when we found out that each of us could be the moderator, could assign someone else to be the moderator, mute and unmute the other participants, and then once in a while we heard Janell slurping her coffee… and poor Mary who could only type her conversations on the side and inadvertently got ignored, because we were mostly looking at our own images or the screen in the center and so we completely forgot to look at the chat off the side (until we turned on the audio chat notification).
One of the big drawbacks of BBB is that it only works on PC and not on mobile devices. Jane tried it on her phone at the airport and I tried it on my iPad, and it just didn't work. Too bad. So we were using each of our personal computers at the comfort of our home or office trying out this “new” tool (at least to most of us). Another drawback according to Marcia is that BBB apparently can only host up to six participants at a time. So she suggested another conference tool called “Go To Meeting” which perhaps we can try next time. For math instructors like Vicky and me, we found BBB is quite clunky…. can’t write mathematical expressions too well with a mouse or it will require us to use one of the tablet computers and bear with the time lagging. Dawn also added another drawback, i.e. it can only keep the recording of the conferences for 14 days. Check out the recording of this first virtual meeting before it disappears in 14 days! (By the way, we forgot to start the recording earlier, so you will only see a partial meeting there.)
Anyway, we accomplished a lot actually in two hours going over the items on the agenda for the day. Dawn introduced another tool called “Padlet,” a brainstorming virtual board. So we also monkeyed around with it, trying to post a few messages and pictures here and there. Then we talked about the recent QM workshop that a few of us participated. It’s called “Using Instructional Materials and Technology to Promote Learner Engagement” focusing on QM Standards 4, 5, and 6. While we found the overall experience is valuable, it is ironic that we the participants didn't find the short course as engaging as the title suggested.
The conversations continued to touch issues on whether we could “require” online students to participate in virtual conferences as a way to engage students. We were wondering whether there is an existing document of online learning expectations, policies, minimum requirements, etc. If not, perhaps FLC can initiate the formation of such document and involve administration to get on board with it. Marcia started a discussion on this on Canvas discussion boards. I’d love everyone of us to chime in. I think our collaborative efforts will help tremendously in dealing with some of the frustrations when students do not respond as we expect them to.
Toward the end of our meeting, I expressed an interest in having another virtual meeting using BBB (or any other tool that we decide to try). Vicky brought up a good point that practicing more with these technology tools (conferencing, discussion boards, etc.) would increase our confidence in using them with our respective students. I think Faculty Learning Community is just the perfect place for us to do that! Before we all left the conference room, Marcia left us with this note: "If you want a chuckle after we are finished, watch this YouTube on web conferencing http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DYu_bGbZiiQ." I don't want to be the spoiler. You've got to watch it yourself.
On a personal note, I thank all of my colleagues for their unique personalities, talents, and expertise. I am thankful for FLC, from which collegial community I gain invaluable knowledge, skills, and overall learning experience as a way to help me to be a more effective instructor teaching online classes that could be challenging at times.
Happy Thanksgiving all!
Anita
Outstanding title, Anita!!! I am still grinning! I promise to respond more substantively to your excellent post soon. :D Dawn
ReplyDeleteFirst of all, the web conferencing video was spot-on and hilarious. Thank you for sharing that, Marcia! I agree with Vicky that more practice with tech tools before sharing them with students is a great idea--it can help us work out the kinks as well as find any glaring issues (especially potential accessibility concerns).
ReplyDeleteIt is interesting that BBB is limited to 6 participants. It seems like it would work for small group projects, office hours, or one-on-one (or a few) conferences rather than function as a good replacement for Blackboard Collaborate. As Mary brought up, this might be a great way for AR to "meet" with students newly registering with our office who may be unable to make it to an in-person meeting (especially as our online enrollment grows).
Yes, the video was perfect and so funny!
DeleteOfficially, BBB isn't limited to six participants. That number is influenced by server capacity and technology tools in use inside a conference. If you wanted to have a large group meet, you might ask students not to use their webcams unless they were moderating.
"The conversations continued to touch issues on whether we could “require” online students to participate in virtual conferences as a way to engage students."
ReplyDeleteThanks for bringing this up in your post, Anita.
Online courses should provide more flexibility than a traditional class might, but that doesn't mean that students work at their own pace without deadlines or participation expectations. For that reason, I think holding synchronous meetings online is a reasonable option for any online class. The important thing is to be clear and upfront about this expectation, preferably in the course catalog and/or description, and to provide as much information about what this kind of meeting will entail for students (dates, times, technology requirements) as soon as that info is available.
For some classes, learning to use specific technologies is (or is part of) a learning outcome, so making decisions about tech is easy. For other situations, maybe the opportunity to "meet" is simply the best way to connect and to teach on a particular subject.
Personally, I think the humanizing, isolation-reducing potential for synchronous meetings is enormous. Online students have to acquire a great majority of information via reading (even "discussions" usually require reading), so that wonderful benefit of coming together to discuss and ask questions that we get in a traditional classroom is often missing online. One way to recreate that is to hold synchronous online meetings, study sessions, lectures, presentations, etc.
If you decide to include synchronous sessions online in your class, though, it seems to me that your job as teacher/facilitator becomes making sure that the technology you ask students to use does not create more barriers than it's worth. It's also important to be sure your students have access to the support that they need to successfully use the tool to facilitate their learning.
I just wanted to document a few things that I got from the follow up meeting off the blog, using BBB in particular.
ReplyDeleteFirst, I wrote in the blog that for writing math problems, BBB is a little clunky. Jane brought up a good idea of using a webcam or document camera to make it possible or easier. Second, having a back up plan is always a wise thing to do in case technology fails. Two ideas mentioned were directing students ahead of time to look at the chat box (don't forget to turn on the notification sound) or assign another person ahead of time to be the moderator in case the instructor is having difficulty with technology. Then we talked about the difference between Admin (manager) who arranges meeting and moderator who is a facilitator of the meeting. Lastly, GoToMeeting is a paid subscription, so I think BBB will be the future conference tool used here at BTC until there is a better one. That's it for now on my notes.