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Focus
Designing for the Virtual Interactive Classroom
4/29/2005
Three Scenarios of Synchronous Gatherings
The challenge lies in sorting through the host of synchronous collaboration tools (probably about 50) that support one or more of these types of collaboration. These tools fall into the categories of Web conferencing, videoconferencing, full collaboration, interactive classrooms, and screen sharing. (To follow the evolution and refinement of these tools, a helpful site to visit is www.kolabora.com/tools.htm.) But before opting for a tool type, it’s vital to understand the scenarios they are appropriate for. There are three synchronous scenarios that faculty will want to design into online and blended courses: small group meetings, interactive class meetings, and large class meetings.
Small group meetings (two to six; no more than 10). This scenario supports highly interactive small group meetings of two to six people, combining live audio and video-feeds. Instructional interactions of this type include office hours, team meetings, tutorials, and study groups. John Campbell, associate VP for Teaching and Learning Technologies at Purdue University (IN), recently commented that Purdue wants an “application-sharing tool that is able to be pumped around the world.” The university also wants to provide a tool for students in professional programs to use “almost on-demand” for project meetings and collaborative problem-solving. Faculty and administrators there have been testing Macromedia’s Breeze Live (www.macromedia.com/ software/breeze) for a year, for both small group and interactive classroom meetings. They are planning to expand its use. At the September 2004 e/merge Blended Learning and Collaborative Technologies Conference (www.voxwire.com/ kolabora/emerge), the following features were mentioned by new media communications author and consultant Robin Good as basic capabilities for these small group collaborations: the application-sharing feature mentioned above, text chat, voice-over-IP chat, the ability to record and save the meeting, a feature that provides knowledge of who is present in real time, and some ability to signal to the group. A primary advantage of these tools over low-tech phone conferences is the ability to share applications and jointly see and revise work; it truly enables small-group work in shared time.
What’s more, tools supporting small group meetings can be specialized for this
size group and be less demanding than those tools supporting larger groups.
In “A Synchronous Online Seminar” (www.powertolearn.com/articles)
at Power to Learn 2004, Jim Lengel, dean of the Benjamin Franklin Institute
of Technology in Boston, describes how Marratech eMeeting (www.marratech.com),
one of the full collaboration tools, supported a synchronous online seminar
(SOS) with participants from around the world: France, California, and Massachusetts.
Lengel noted that the tool enabled them to “see and hear each other, exchange
papers, and sketch things out in diagrams as we talked.” The software resided
on a server at
The Foundation for California Community Colleges (FCCC) has awarded a statewide emergency alert notification contract to Waterfall Mobile. The contract establishes Waterfall's AlertU as an approved technology through the official non-profit foundation for the California Community College (CCC) system office. Through this partnership, individual colleges may directly implement emergency communication services, eliminating lengthy technology evaluation and RFP processes. King's College and Arizona State University have switched to Omnilert's e2Campus for emergency notification. Omnilert also has introduced a new program called the ENS Conversion Service that allows schools to bulk upload data from their previous emergency notification system into e2Campus at no charge. Saint Joseph's University has begun deploying a Meru Networks wireless local area network across its Philadelphia campus as part of a multi-year effort to bring wireless coverage to every building on campus. Organizations may have been slow to adopt Microsoft Windows Vista, but expect that to change by late 2008 to 2009, according to a Forrester Research report by Benjamin Gray et al., published last week. Talisma Corp. announced version 8.0 of its constituent relationship management (CRM) application for higher education. The new release includes application management, a revamped user interface, two-way text messaging, personalized Web portals, and an ADA-compliant Web client, among other enhancements. Two Pennsylvania teaching colleagues with an interest in music and technology are bringing remote experts into classrooms at almost no cost, using Skype's free videoconferencing technology.
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